The Supreme Court is about to decide the fate of so-called assault weapons bans, but the state backing them misrepresents the key history that will determine the outcome.
Connecticut just filed its response brief in Grant v. Higgins, defending its ban on possessing unregistered AR-15s and similar firearms. It has been consolidated with Viramontes v. Cook County. Oral arguments will be heard December 2, 2026. In the brief, Connecticut justifies its ban by citing historical English laws from as far back as the 14th Century that it argues prohibited possession of several kinds of weapons. Given what it held in New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruen, the Supreme Court is unlikely to rely on English laws many decades or even centuries removed from the Founding when deciding the case.
However, even taken at face value, these older laws are not what Connecticut claims.
Connecticut first points to regulations on the lancegay. That weapon was “a type of spear or lance, but that it was probably considerably lighter than a full-length war lance,” according to the University of Bristol Centre for Medieval Studies’ David Scott-Macnab. Connecticut relies on two laws, one from 1383 and another from 1396, which it claims prohibited owning lancegays.
But the 1383 law only banned possessing a lancegay while riding. It prohibited carrying lancegays unless one had a special license from the King. Richard II later “affirmed the validity of his 1383 legislation” in 1396 with the second law Connecticut relies on and “ordained and assented that no man shall ride armed within the realm, against the form of the Statute of Northampton thereupon made, nor with launcegays.”
Again, this second law merely prohibited the carrying of lancegays while riding. English law did not ban possession of a lancegay in one’s home. Connecticut is misinterpreting these laws as a ban on possession to justify their ban on AR-15-style rifles.
Historical evidence demonstrates that lancegays weren’t just lawful to own; they were actually quite popular.
“Among the myriad items recorded in an inventory of the possessions of the English gentleman-soldier and landowner Sir John Fastolf Caister Castle, Norfolk, we find that his magna aula, or great hall, contained an assortment of weapons…a ‘Launce gay,’” Scott-Macnab wrote of the arms in 2009.
“[W]e find that Sir John Fastolfe was far from alone in owning such a weapon. Brother Hugh Middleton, commander of the English contingent of the Knights Hospitaler at Rhodes, owned one too,” he wrote.
Court records from the Borough of Nottingham show “[e]ven common folk with no military associations seem to have possessed the weapon, as we learn from a legal action brought by John Melburn of Nottingham, a weaver, for the return of a lancegay-shaft.”
If the lancegay was illegal to possess, Mr. Melburn could not have brought a judicial action to compel its return. Nor could his action have been successful, which it was. And “John Scrope” “bequeathed his ‘launchgay cum uno batillaxe’ to his brother in 1452” via a will which was legally registered. If the lancegay was illegal to possess, then Mr. Scrope would not have been able to legally bequeath his lancegay to his brother.
Further evidence that Englishmen were not prohibited from possessing lancegays comes from a “stern edict issued by Henry VI to the sheriff of Worcester in 1457” that “the king would not tolerate a variety of unlawful acts, including riding about armed with lancegays and other weapons.”
“The King to the Sheriff of Worcester, greeting. . . . We instruct you . . . to proclaim in public that no-one . . . ride on horseback armed with lances, lancegays, swords and other weapons, contrary to the laws and statutes promulgated and published on this issue . . . .’),” the edict said.
If there was a ban on possession of the lancegay, then this edict would not have included the lancegay in a ban on the carrying of weapons which were legal to own. In fact, Englishmen were long required to own many of the weapons in this list. The 1181 Assize of Arms required all British men to own arms commensurate with their financial ability to purchase them.
Connecticut has misinterpreted these laws as prohibitions on possession. In reality, it was legal to own lancegays in Medieval England.
Connecticut also relied on Medieval English restrictions on crossbows and handguns. The first of these is most readily distinguishable because it had an express exemption for home defense. “None shall shoot with a Cross Bow, unless for Defence of his House, other than a Lord, or a Person having zoo Marks Freehold per Ann,” it read.
These laws culminated in 1542’s Acte Concerning Crossbows and Handguns. It prohibited some Englishmen from possessing crossbows and handguns. But there are several differences between this law and Connecticut’s modern AR-15 ban.
First, this law only applied to the poor. It did not apply to those who “have lands, tenements, fees, annuities or office to the yearly value of one hundred pounds.” Thus, it was a class-based law that is irrelevant in deciding the scope of the American right to arms. Furthermore, the primary purpose behind England’s ban on crossbows and small handguns was to aid in the national defense. The express rationale of that law was to promote the use of the longbow.
“[S]erving men now of late have laid apart the good and laudable exercise of the long bow, which always heretofore hath been the surest safeguard and continual defense of this Realm of England, and an inestimable dread and terror to the enemies of the same,” it read.
Englishmen were encouraged, and often required, to own longbows in particular. Edward III of England’s declaration of 1363 expressly encouraged their use:
“Whereas the people of our realm, rich and poor alike, were accustomed formerly in their games to practise archery – whence by God’s help, it is well known that high honour and profit came to our realm, and no small advantage to ourselves in our warlike enterprises… that every man in the same country, if he be able-bodied, shall, upon holidays, make use, in his games, of bows and arrows… and so learn and practise archery,” he wrote.
Further, in 1511, Henry VIII ordered that all men under the age of 60 practice shooting regularly, and that fathers be responsible for providing their sons and young male servants with archery equipment and training. England even banned other sports to promote the practice of archery. The Unlawful Games Act of 1541 was an Act of the Parliament of England, designed to prohibit “Several new devised Games” that caused “the Decay of Archery.” All Men under the Age of sixty Years “shall have Bows and Arrows for shooting.” Men and children between seven “Years and Seventeen shall have a Bow and 2 Shafts.” Men above seventeen “shall keep a Bow and 4 Arrows.” That law remained in effect until the Gaming Act of 1845 repealed much of it.
The 16th Century saw the advent of crossbows and early firearms. As Justice Clarence Thomas wrote for the majority in Bruen, “Henry VIII worried that handguns threatened Englishmen’s proficiency with the longbow—a weapon many believed was crucial to English military victories in the 1300s and 1400s, including the legendary English victories at Crécy and Agincourt.” That concern over military readiness catalyzed the laws Connecticut cites, whereas Connecticut alleges its ban on AR-15 rifles prevents crime.
Thus, the “how” (a ban on possession just for the poor) and the “why” (national defense) of the 16th-century ban are different from Connecticut’s law. Connecticut’s claim that crossbows and handguns were completely banned because they were highly dangerous weapons is simply not true. To the extent they were restricted, it was because they were not effective enough in a military context.
Additionally, the complete arms bans that Connecticut did identify were very short-lived.
The first is Stuart Royal Proclamation No. 126 from 1613, which banned small handguns. However, this law was amended shortly after, in 1616, to ban only the making, selling, or carrying of them. And, contrary to Connecticut’s assertion that this law prohibited small handguns because they were exceptionally dangerous, the 1613 law makes clear those items were typically used by criminals. The 1616 law expanded on this and explained that these weapons were not suitable for military purposes or self-defense.
A ban on carry is not the same as the ban on unregistered “assault weapon” possession in Connecticut. Furthermore, the rationale for this prohibition was much different. The 1616 Stuart Royal Proclamation Number 160 said the weapons were prohibited because they were “vtterly vnseruiceable for defence, Militarie practise, or other lawfull vse, but odious, and noted Instruments of murther, and mischiefe.” As with the 1542 law discussed above, the concern was these weapons were not effective for self-defense or military purposes. Contrary to Connecticut’s representation, these weapons were not restricted because they were especially dangerous. Their carry was prohibited because their typical use lacked a lawful purpose.
At most, this law confirms what Heller already tells us: that the weapons protected by the right to arms are those in common use for lawful purposes.
Connecticut then relies on the Game Act of 1671 as an example of a law that banned all gun possession. There’s some dispute among historians about the scope of the law, but the text indicates it was merely designed to prevent the peasantry from hunting. It prohibited people who were not wealthy from having “Guns, Bowes, Grey hounds, Setting-dogs, Ferretts, Cony-doggs, Lurchers, Hayes, Netts, Lowbells, Hare-pipes, Ginns, Snares or other Engines aforesaid” for hunting.
Historically, as the Duke Center for Firearms Law’s Catie Carberry has pointed out, the term gun did not refer to pistols. It makes sense that pistols were excluded because the law’s express purpose was to prevent the poor from hunting, and pistols are less suited for that purpose. While the law did cover guns when first passed, it was quickly replaced by the Game Act of 1692. That act superseded the previous act and removed “guns” from its list of prohibited items.
It is likely not a coincidence that this law was passed around the same time as the 1689 English Bill of Rights, which guaranteed “[t]hat the subjects which are Protestants may have arms for their defence suitable to their conditions and as allowed by law.” However, the 1692 Game Act and its subsequent amendments contained a clause which still prohibited any other “engine” which could be used for hunting–engine essentially meaning instrument.
Subsequent litigation demonstrated that these laws did not apply to firearms when not used for hunting. In 1739’s Rex v. Gardner, an individual was charged with violating the Game Act of 1705 for owning a gun. The court concluded that “a gun differs from nets and dogs, which can only be kept for an ill purpose, and therefore this conviction must be quashed.”
“[I]f the statute is to be construed so largely, as to extend to the bare having of any instrument, that may possibly be used in destroying game, it will be attended with very great inconvenience; there being scarce any, tho’ ever so useful, but what may be applied to that purpose,” the justices reasoned “And tho’ a gun may be used in destroying game, and when it is so, doth then fall within the words of the act; yet as it is an instrument proper, and frequently necessary to be kept and used for other purposes, as the killing of noxious vermin, and the like, it is not the having a gun, without applying it in the destruction of game, that is prohibited by the act.”
Similarly, in 1752’s Wingfield v. Stratford & Osman, a man challenged his conviction under the Game Act and the confiscation of his gun and dog. The prosecution’s plea was held faulty, but the court pointed out that it would have held for appellant in any case as the prosecution had not alleged that the gun had been used for killing game:
“It is not to be imagined, that it was the Intention of the Legislature, in making the 5 Ann.c.14 to disarm all the People of England,” the court wrote. “[A]s Guns are not expressly mentioned in that Statute, and as a Gun may be kept for the Defence of a Man’s House, and for divers other lawful Purposes, it was necessary to alledge, in order to its being comprehended within the Meaning of the Words ‘any other Engines to kill the Game’, that the Gun had been used for killing the Game.”
As these two cases make clear, the inclusion of guns in the Game Act was short-lived, and the Act was quickly amended to remove guns. Connecticut’s reliance on the Game Act of 1671 is misplaced.
The vast majority of the laws Connecticut relies on either did not ban the possession of arms or exempted the wealthy, and the ones that did ban possession did not last. Ultimately, the historical gun regulations the state relies on to defend its modern AR-15 ban did not operate in a similar manner.
