MA GUN LAWYER

On January 2, 2026, a divided panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit (2–1) held unconstitutional California’s “urban open-carry ban”—a rule that effectively prohibited open carry in every county with a population over 200,000, i.e., the counties where roughly 95% of Californians live.

The case is Baird v. Bonta, brought by Mark Baird, who argued that California’s population-based carveout was not a regulation of the right to bear arms, but an evisceration of it—turning open carry into a niche privilege for a small fraction of the state, while banning it for everyone else by default.

The holding in plain English

The panel concluded that California’s ban fails under the Supreme Court’s test in NYSRPA v. Bruen (2022), because:

1. Open carry is within the Second Amendment’s text (“bear arms”).
2. The State did not carry its burden of producing a relevantly similar historical tradition that justifies banning open carry across the places where most people actually live.
3. In the panel’s words, this was “straightforward” under Bruen: California was trying to address modern concerns using materially different means than anything accepted at the Founding or Reconstruction. The opinion leaned heavily on the familiar antebellum line that a prohibition on bearing arms openly conflicts with the Constitution (citing authorities like Nunn).

Why the “200,000 residents” line mattered

California didn’t merely regulate open carry. It split the map:

• In “rural” counties (<200,000), the State said open-carry licensing exists (though the record discussed how illusory that was in practice).
• In “urban” counties (>200,000), open carry was simply off the table—even for otherwise eligible, law-abiding adults.

Under Bruen, a state can’t defend that kind of sweeping categorical ban with generalized appeals to public safety or modern urban conditions unless it can point to historical analogues that are genuinely comparable in how and why they burden the right. The panel said California didn’t do that.

What this means (and what it doesn’t)

A few important caveats—especially if you’re reading headlines and thinking this instantly “changes everything”:

• This is a panel decision, and California may pursue en banc review and/or Supreme Court review. Reuters and other outlets flagged that further review is likely.
• The ruling targets California’s population-based open-carry ban. It does not necessarily invalidate every location-based restriction or licensing rule California has enacted (those battles are already playing out case-by-case post-Bruen).

The Massachusetts angle: “Neither legalized nor prohibited” is basically accurate—and frought with dangers for lawful gun owners

Massachusetts is a different animal—not because the right is permissibly different here (yes, shocking to some that the 2^nd Amendment does apply here), but because the statutory architecture and enforcement culture are.

Massachusetts law generally doesn’t draw an “open vs. concealed” line

Massachusetts licensing law broadly describes what an LTC authorizes—i.e., the right to “possess and carry firearms”—without using the kind of categorical “open carry is legal / concealed carry is legal” language you see in other states.

So as a descriptive matter, many people summarize Massachusetts this way:

Massachusetts law does not expressly “legalize” open carry—and it also doesn’t expressly prohibit it—because the statutes typically regulate carrying, not visibility.

That framing is directionally fair as a matter of text, but it can lull people into thinking open carry is some safe “gotcha” zone. It isn’t.

My admonition:

If you’re carrying openly in Massachusetts, you should assume two practical consequences are in play even if you believe you’re technically compliant with the law:

1) You may get charged with something like disorderly conduct / disturbing the peace

Massachusetts has a broad “disorderly persons and disturbers of the peace” statute.
Even when a firearm-related charge isn’t available (or doesn’t “fit”), the event—calls from alarmed bystanders, a tense police response, a disputed interaction—can become the hook for a Ch. 272 § 53 arrest or summons theory.

2) Charged or not, your licensing authority will likely treat it as “unsuitability” and move to suspend your LTC, no matter how unconstitutional doing so may be.

Massachusetts firearms licensing consequences do not always wait for a conviction. The post-2024 framework expressly contemplates revocation/suspension mechanisms and written reasons. And Massachusetts has long litigated the reach of “suitability” concepts in licensing disputes, including in the well-known Firearms Records Bureau v. Simkin (2013) licensing fight as well as Attorney Smith’s case, Pratt v. Westbrook, which is currently pending at the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court.

Bottom line: Even if open carry is not singled out in statutory text as “illegal,” the predictable chain reaction—911 calls, “man with a gun” responses, police contact, report writing, and licensing scrutiny—can turn your day into a criminal case, and then into a licensing war.

I get calls on this from time to time.   I advise strongly against open carrying in Massachusetts—period. Not because I think it’s morally wrong, but because I think (1) you’re likely to get charged with something like disorderly conduct / disturbing the peace, and (2) whether you’re charged or not, your licensing authority will likely use it as an excuse to suspend your LTC indefinitely.   This, at least unless and until such time as the United States Supreme Court decides this issue definitively.

That isn’t surrendering the constitutional principle. It’s simply recognizing the terrain.

Why Baird matters beyond California

For Second Amendment advocates, Baird v. Bonta is significant for one reason: it treats open carry as not a novelty, not a loophole, and not a second-class method of bearing arms. It treats it as part of the core right—something the State can regulate, but not erase for “most people, most places” without a hard historical showing.

It also serves to illustrate a common tactic that is being used by anti-2^nd Amendment extremists:

Like the Hawaii law currently under review at the US Supreme Court, the California law created a blanket ban without calling it a blanket ban.  One could very plausibly argue that the Massachusetts “unsuitability” law effectuates the same type of blanket prohibition.   After all, given that you can be denied the right to carry (and possess) based on the subjective whim of a police chief without any objective criteria that must be applied in reaching his or her determination that you “may pose a public safety risk”, the 2^nd Amendment in Massachusetts is in large measure illusory at present.  

I, like other 2^nd Amendment attorneys here in Massachusetts, am working hard to change that.

If Bruen means what it says—text first, history second, and the burden on the government—then population-based bans that swallow the right for the overwhelming majority of citizens should remain on very thin ice.

This and all other articles in this blog are general commentary, not legal advice.