Main: The University of Michigan sign is shown next to a walkway (WDIV/YouTube)/ Inset top: Members of the Supreme Court sit for a new group portrait in Washington, Friday, Oct. 7, 2022. Bottom row, from left, Associate Justice Sonia Sotomayor, Associate Justice Clarence Thomas, Chief Justice of the United States John Roberts, Associate Justice Samuel Alito, and Associate Justice Elena Kagan. Top row, from left, Associate Justice Amy Coney Barrett, Associate Justice Neil Gorsuch, Associate Justice Brett Kavanaugh, and Associate Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite). Inset bottom: In this photo taken on Wednesday, April 15, 2015, gun advocate Joshua Wade is interviewed before the school board meeting at Skyline High School, in Ann Arbor, Mich. (AP Photo/The Ann Arbor News, Nicole Hester).
Just days after a fatal campus shooting in Florida, the Supreme Court of the United States opted to keep in place a firearm ban at the University of Michigan.
The Court denied certiorari without comment Monday in a case that challenged the school’s campus firearm restrictions, which means that a lower state court ruling upholding the constitutionality of the ban will stay in place.
A decade-old case
In 2001, the University of Michigan adopted a policy — known as “Article X” — that prohibits carrying firearms, dangerous weapons and knives on government and school property. The prohibition applies to anyone “regardless of whether the individual has a concealed weapons permit or is otherwise authorized by law to possess, discharge, or use any device referenced below.” The ordinance allows a civilian to carry weapons if they have permission from the director of the university’s Department of Public Safety.
Joshua Wade was an employee of the University of Michigan Credit Union and in 2014, he requested permission to carry a firearm on campus from the university’s Public Safety Director. Wade’s request was denied, and in June 2015, he sued the University of Michigan in June 2015 to challenge its policy.
The case waits for the justices
The University of Michigan provided a summary explaining the legality of Article X shortly thereafter, which was upheld by the Michigan Court of Appeals in 2017. Wade then appealed to the Michigan Supreme Court, which initially agreed to hear the case, but then revoked that decision while awaiting the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in the 2022 New York State Rifle & Pistol Association, Inc. v. Bruen.
In that case, the justices struck down New York state’s licensing regime, ruling that it was unconstitutional to require residents to demonstrate a “special need” to carry a firearm outside of their homes, particularly in areas designated as “sensitive” by the state of New York. The decision set up framework for analyzing firearm restrictions that required courts to uphold restrictions only when those restrictions conform to the nation’s “history and tradition” of gun laws.
Bruen, however, did allow for bans “in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings.”
Restrictions that survive Bruen
After Bruen, the Michigan Court of Appeals reconsidered the case and sided with the school, leaving the gun restriction in place.
Wade appealed again, arguing that the university’s firearm ban functioned as a complete nullification of the Second Amendment for anyone who lives, works, or studies near the campus. He also argued that universities are more like cities than schools and should not be considered “sensitive places.”
In October 2024, the Michigan Supreme Court also sided against Wade.
Wade petitioned the justices for certiorari, arguing that without their intervention, the Second Amendment would be treated as a “second-class right, subject to an entirely different body of rules than the other Bill of Rights guarantees.”
The justices declined to do so Monday, and without comment, left the Michigan Supreme Court’s ruling in place.
The ruling comes just days after a gunman opened fire at Florida State University, killing two and injuring six.
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