Pennsylvania Under-21 Carry Ban Draws FPC, NRA Lawsuit

Last updated October 2026 · By Nick Hall, who tracks Pennsylvania gun law and the under-21 carry cases in its federal and state courts

Quick take: The Firearms Policy Coalition and the NRA sued Pennsylvania on October 29 over the rule that you must be 21 to apply for a license to carry. This is a complaint and nothing more so far, with no ruling, so the age limit stays in force.

• What happened: Daniel Maines, FPC and the NRA filed Maines v. Bethel in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania on October 29, 2026, as case 2:26-cv-08301.
• Why it matters: Without a license, an 18-to-20-year-old cannot lawfully carry concealed or keep a gun in a vehicle outside narrow exceptions.
• What’s next: The defendants have not answered, and the docket shows only the complaint.
• Who to watch: The Pennsylvania Supreme Court, which has agreed to hear a challenge to the same age limit brought by a man who was 19 when he was arrested.

Most under-21 suits pit a state against one federal appeals ruling. Pennsylvania has two court systems pointed in opposite directions, and only one of them shows up in this complaint. We pulled the filing, the statutes and the opinions so you don’t have to.

Table of Contents

What the Maines v. Bethel Complaint Actually Asks For

The lead plaintiff is Daniel Maines, a Philadelphia County resident the complaint describes as over 18 and under 21, never charged with a crime, and a member of both FPC and the NRA. The two groups also sue for their Pennsylvania members aged 18 to 20.

There are two defendants, both sued in their official capacity. Kevin Bethel is Philadelphia’s Police Commissioner, whose office handles license applications in the city.

Lt. Col. George L. Bivens, identified in the complaint as head and Acting Commissioner of the Pennsylvania State Police, is there because his agency runs the Pennsylvania Instant Check System (PICS) and prescribes the license form.

The ask is narrower than the “Carry Ban” label in the filing suggests. Plaintiffs want a declaration that 18-to-20-year-olds have a right to carry outside the home, a permanent injunction against enforcing the age bar in 18 Pa.C.S. § 6109(b), an order stopping Bivens from running PICS in a way that blocks licenses for that age group, plus costs and attorney fees. They want into the license system. They are not asking a court to abolish it.

And none of that has happened. The public docket we checked holds one entry, the complaint and its civil cover sheet, with no injunction motion, no response from the state and no order.

What an 18-to-20-Year-Old Can Do in Pennsylvania Today

The text at the center of the case is one sentence in Pennsylvania’s gun laws: “An individual who is 21 years of age or older may apply to a sheriff for a license to carry a firearm concealed on or about his person or in a vehicle within this Commonwealth.” That is § 6109(b), and it still governs.

Concealed or in a vehicle: no license means a crime under § 6106(a). It is written as a third-degree felony, punishable by up to seven years, with a first-degree misdemeanor track for someone “otherwise eligible to possess a valid license.” The exceptions in § 6106(b) are specific: going to or from target practice with the gun “not loaded,” hunters with a hunting license and a sportsman’s firearm permit, and trips such as purchase or repair where the gun is unloaded and “in a secure wrapper.”

Open carry on foot: legal in most of the state with no license. The Superior Court put it plainly in Commonwealth v. Sumpter: “In all other areas of the Commonwealth, unlicensed open carry is permitted at age 18.”

Philadelphia: this one is messier than the complaint lets on. Section 6108 on its face requires a license to carry on the city’s public streets, and plaintiffs say they cannot carry there. But Sumpter, a 2-1 decision from June 23, 2025, threw out an open-carry conviction under § 6108 on equal protection grounds as applied to that defendant, and the Commonwealth’s bid to appeal is on hold at the Pennsylvania Supreme Court while it takes up the same § 6108 question, as of a June 2026 Superior Court opinion, in Commonwealth v. Livingston. I wouldn’t treat that as a green light.

School zones: federal law, 18 U.S.C. § 922(q), bars knowingly possessing a gun within 1,000 feet of school grounds, with an exception for someone licensed by the state after a qualification check. No Pennsylvania license for under-21s means no use of that exception. Other exceptions remain, including private property that is not school grounds and an unloaded gun in a locked container, so the zone is not absolute.

The complaint counts more than 2,900 Pennsylvania schools, and a 1,000-foot circle covers about 72 acres before you add the school’s own land. FPC’s Louisiana permit suit makes the same school-zone argument from a state that lets 18-year-olds carry concealed without a permit.

Why “Sues Pennsylvania Again” Points Back to Lara

FPC’s release calls this suing Pennsylvania “again,” and the earlier case is Lara. Three young adults, FPC and the Second Amendment Foundation filed it in October 2020 in the Western District of Pennsylvania, case 2:20-cv-01582. The NRA was not a party.

It took a long road. The district court dismissed it on April 16, 2021, the Third Circuit reversed in January 2024, and the Supreme Court vacated that ruling on October 15, 2024, for another look after Rahimi. The Third Circuit reached the same result in its January 13, 2025 opinion, 125 F.4th 428, with Judge Restrepo dissenting. Pennsylvania petitioned again, and the Supreme Court docket shows the entry “Petition DENIED” on June 30, 2026.

But Lara was about emergencies. The relief it ordered was an injunction “forbidding the Commissioner from arresting law-abiding 18-to-20-year-olds who openly carry firearms during a state of emergency declared by the Commonwealth,” and the panel itself called the question “a narrow one.” The complaint argues that Lara’s reasoning “controls this case,” which is the plaintiffs’ reading and a fair argument, since the court held 18-to-20-year-olds are among “the people.” Whether that reaches the license age is what this suit now puts to a federal judge.

FPC President Brandon Combs, in the group’s release, is not hedging: “We’ve beaten age-based bans before, including in Pennsylvania, and we’re coming back to finish the job.”

The Pennsylvania Courts Went the Other Way

Here’s what the complaint leaves out. It never mentions Commonwealth v. Williams, a criminal case about a 19-year-old with a handgun in a vehicle. In that 2025 opinion the Superior Court held that “section 6109 is consistent with the nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation,” and it said it was not bound by the Third Circuit.

The same court followed that on June 1, 2026, in Commonwealth v. Caruso, involving an 18-year-old. Its line could not be flatter: “Williams is binding on this panel; Third Circuit decisions are not.” The Pennsylvania Supreme Court agreed on January 6, 2026 to hear Williams on the §§ 6106 and 6109 questions, and the Caruso opinion listed it as pending that June.

So a 20-year-old stopped in a car in Philadelphia and a 20-year-old suing in the federal courthouse downtown are working under different precedent on the same age limit, because a federal judge there answers to the Third Circuit and a state trial judge answers to the Superior Court. Massachusetts already went the state’s way when its high court upheld an age 21 license rule this month, while the complaint cites the Eighth Circuit’s Worth and the Fifth Circuit’s Reese on the other side.

There is a practical catch too. Sheriffs issue licenses outside Philadelphia, and no sheriff is a defendant, which makes the request aimed at the State Police and PICS the one to watch.

What Happens Next in Maines v. Bethel

The defendants respond next. Until a judge rules or the legislature changes the statute, do not plan on a license before 21.

Same age limit. Two court systems. Only one has answered on the license so far.

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Related Reading

• Pennsylvania Gun Laws: LTCF, PICS and § 6109
• Massachusetts High Court Upholds Under-21 Gun Carry Ban
• Louisiana Lets 18-Year-Olds Carry, Then Won’t Issue Them a Permit
• DOJ Says the Under-21 Handgun Sales Ban Is Unconstitutional
• Third Circuit Rules Felon Gun Ban Can’t Reach Two Old DUIs
• Complete Guide to Concealed Carry