The Expansive ‘Sensitive Places’ Doctrine: The Limited Right to ‘Keep and Bear’ Arms Outside the Home

Julia Hesse & Kevin Schascheck II

Julia Hesse is the co-chair of Healthcare Group at Choate Hall & Stewart LLP. She is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania Law School ’01 and the University of Pennsylvania Center for Bioethics ’01.

Kevin Schascheck is currently serving as a federal law clerk. No view expressed herein reflects the opinion or written work of the judge for whom he is clerking. He is a graduate of the University of Virginia School of Law ’22.

9 Jan 2024

In Bruen, the Supreme Court struck down New York’s “may-issue” licensing regime, recognized the right to carry arms outside the home, and announced the historical analogue method to analyze the constitutionality of modern gun laws. In doing so, the Court did not disavow the ‘sensitive places’ doctrine announced in Heller.

In response, New York and other states enacted gun safety laws on the basis of location. This Article provides an account of the doctrinal and historical support for such regulations, proposes a list of locations where gun regulations will survive constitutional scrutiny, and offers a theory of gravitational pull whereby the places around ‘sensitive places’ become sensitive by virtue of their proximity to the core ‘sensitive place.’

To read this Article, please click here: The Expansive ‘Sensitive Places’ Doctrine: The Limited Right to ‘Keep and Bear’ Arms Outside the Home.