The Supreme Court just vastly expanded gun rights. Here’s what happens next.

More guns are coming

One in 4 Americans will feel the impact of the Supreme Court's landmark decision to expand gun rights — a ruling that could also affect the Senate's bipartisan gun bill, according to constitutional law experts and gun-safety advocates,  Qazet.az reports.

In its first major ruling on a Second Amendment case in more than a decade, the court on Thursday struck down a concealed-carry provision in New York that requires gun owners who want to carry a handgun outside their home to prove that they have a unique need for self-protection.

The justices, in a 6-3 decision, said the century-old restriction was unconstitutional, making it easier now for millions of people to carry handguns in public.

“More guns are coming,” said Adam Winkler, a UCLA Law professor who specializes in the Supreme Court and the Second Amendment.

Forced to eliminate proper cause requirements, officials in New York are now scrambling to soften the blow. It’s unclear how much time officials in the state have to implement a new permitting process.

Winkler said the case has been sent back to a lower court, which will likely give the state Legislature some time to adopt a new concealed-carry application system. 

In an address moments after the ruling was handed down, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul said she was prepared to call the state Legislature back into session.

“We’re not going to cede our rights that easily," Hochul, a Democrat, said, adding that officials have been preparing for the ruling for weeks with legal and gun-safety experts.

Hochul said leaders have "language we’d like to now enact into law," although it's unclear what the proposed legislation entails.

Winkler and other legal experts said New York could compensate by enacting more onerous restrictions in other areas, including on purchasing requirements and strengthening other concealed-carry requirements, such as firearm training.

But beyond New York, the Supreme Court’s ruling throws into question the validity of comparable concealed-carry restrictions in several other states, including California, Maryland, Massachusetts and New Jersey, where applicants must similarly prove to a licensing authority that they have a “good” cause or reason, or a “justifiable need” to carry a handgun. 

“It’s a small number of states, but it contains a quarter of the population,” said Adam Skaggs, chief counsel and policy director with the Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. “One in 4 Americans are going to feel the impact of this case.”

In its 135-page ruling, the Supreme Court said that “going forward,” those handful of states “may continue to require licenses for carrying handguns for self-defense,” so long as they follow the less-restrictive requirements used by 43 other states.

Those requirements may include fingerprinting, a background check, a mental health records check, and training in firearms handling and in laws regarding the use of force, the justices said.