United States v. Freeman, 701 F.Supp.3d 716

Freeman, a person with a prior felony, was indicted under 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1) for possession of a firearm and moved to dismiss under the Second Amendment after Bruen.
The district court initially denied dismissal, then reconsidered after the Seventh Circuit’s decision in Atkinson v. Garland, which instructed courts to apply Bruen’s text-and-history framework and remanded similar challenges for fuller historical analysis.
The government argued felons are excluded from “the people” protected by the Second Amendment and relied on historical analogues (colonial/English disarmament, loyalty-oath disarmament, and historical punishments like forfeiture/death).
The court concluded Bruen requires both (1) a determination whether felons fall within the Amendment’s plain text and (2) a showing that historical regulations are sufficiently analogous to § 922(g)(1).
The court held the government failed to prove felons are excluded from “the people” and also failed to identify historical analogues that impose a comparable burden and comparable justification to § 922(g)(1)’s permanent categorical ban.
Result: the court granted Freeman’s motion to reconsider and dismissed the indictment under Bruen (striking other dates/motions as moot).

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Whether § 922(g)(1) falls outside the Second Amendment’s plain text	Freeman: Bruen’s text-and-history test covers him; prior rulings insufficient	Govt: Felons are not “the people”; Amendment applies only to law‑abiding members of the political community	Court: Govt did not meet its burden to show felons are excluded from “the people”; move to history required
Whether history and tradition justify § 922(g)(1)’s permanent, categorical ban	Freeman: No historical analog sufficiently similar or equally burdensome/justified	Govt: Analogues include English/colonial disarmament, loyalty-oath laws, and historical forfeiture/death for felonies	Court: Historical evidence fails to show a comparably burdensome and justified tradition; permanent categorical disarmament of felons not supported — indictment dismissed

142 S. Ct. 2111 (Supreme Court) (articulating text-and-history test for Second Amendment challenges)
554 U.S. 570 (Supreme Court) (Heller: Second Amendment is individual right; acknowledged longstanding prohibitions on felons)
561 U.S. 742 (Supreme Court) (McDonald: Second Amendment incorporated against the states)
70 F.4th 1018 (7th Cir. 2023) (Atkinson: remanded felon-disarmament claims for Bruen analysis and listed guiding historical questions)
621 F.3d 681 (7th Cir.) (Yancey: Congress enacted categorical exclusions to keep guns from presumptively risky people)
69 F.4th 96 (3d Cir. 2023) (Range en banc: held § 922(g)(1) unconstitutional as applied where history did not support disarmament analogue)
69 F.4th 495 (8th Cir. 2023) (Jackson: upheld § 922(g)(1) as consistent with historical tradition for certain felony convictions)
919 F.3d 437 (7th Cir. 2019) (Kanter: discussed historical regulation and civic character in Second Amendment context)
798 F.3d 664 (7th Cir. 2015) (Meza-Rodriguez: cautioned against defining “the people” narrowly despite references to law-abiding citizens)
581 F.3d 561 (7th Cir.) (Buchmeier: discussed restoration of rights and methods to regain civil rights)
913 F.3d 152 (D.C. Cir. 2019) (Medina: discussed severity of historical punishments and their probative value on dispossession)