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Second, in addition to comparing “why” historical regulations and their modern
counterparts burden Second Amendment rights, courts should compare “how” they do so,
that is, “whether modern and historical regulations impose a comparable burden on the
right.” Id. at 2133. In Footnote Nine, the Bruen Court identified how shall-issue licensing
regimes burden the right to keep and bear arms: using “narrow, objective, and definite
standards” to identify persons rightfully prohibited from possessing or carrying a firearm,
licensing officials deny those individuals a license, while issuing licenses to all other
1783, ch. 13, 1783 Mass. Acts 218, 218–219 (prohibiting loaded firearms in “any
Dwelling-House, Stable, Barn, Out-house, Ware-house, Store, Shop, or other Building,
within the Town of Boston” and authorizing seizure of such arms and a fine); Act of Apr.
13, 1784, ch. 28, 1784 N.Y. Laws 627, 627–629 (prohibiting “any quantity of gun powder
exceeding twenty-eight pounds weight, in any one place” in New York City “except in the
public magazine” and requiring gunpowder to be “seperated into four stone jugs or tin
cannisters, which shall not contain more than seven pounds each, on pain of forfeiting all
such gun powder” and paying a fine); Act of Feb. 28, 1786, § I, 1786 N.H. Laws 383, 383–
384 (prohibiting “more than ten pounds of gun-powder” in “any dwelling-house, store or
other building, on land, within the limits of said Portsmouth” and requiring gunpowder to
“be kept in a tin cannister properly secured for that purpose” or else “forfeit the powder”
illegally kept and pay a fine); Act of Mar. 28, 1787, ch. 328, § II, 1786 Pa. Laws 502, 502–
503 (prohibiting “any house, store, shop, cellar or other place, within the city of
Philadelphia” from storing “any greater quantity of gunpowder, at one time, than thirty
pounds . . . under the penalty of forfeiture of the whole quantity so over and above stored
or kept, together with the sum of twenty pounds for every such offence”); Act of June 19,
1801, ch. 20, § 1, 1801 Mass. Acts 507, 507–508 (prohibiting storage of gunpowder in any
“house or shop for sale, by retail” exceeding “twenty-five pounds” and requiring
gunpowder to be “kept in brass, copper or tin Tunnels” subject to “forfeiting all such Gun
Powder”). The Supreme Court in Bruen nevertheless treated modern training requirements
as covered by the historically justifiable purpose of ensuring that “those bearing arms in
the jurisdiction are, in fact, law-abiding, responsible citizens.” 142 S. Ct. at 2138 n.9
(internal quotation marks omitted). Plaintiffs have not identified any basis to depart from
that reasoning in the context of restrictions on possession, so I follow Bruen’s lead and
conclude that the justification underlying the training component of Maryland’s handgun
license requirement is sufficiently comparable to historical precursors prohibiting firearm
possession on dangerousness grounds.