Retired Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens said in an op-ed published Tuesday that demonstrators who took to the streets over the weekend to protest gun violence should seek a repeal of the Second Amendment.
Stevens, who served as an associate justice on the nation's highest court from 1975 until his retirement in 2010, said in a New York Times op-ed that the nationwide "March for Our Lives" demonstrations showed that there is "broad public support for legislation to minimize the risk of mass killings of schoolchildren and others in our society."
"But the demonstrators should seek more effective and more lasting reform," Stevens wrote. He added that the reasoning that prompted the creation of the Second Amendment no longer applied to modern-day America.
The Second Amendment states that “a well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.”
But, Stevens wrote, "Concern that a national standing army might pose a threat to the security of the separate states … is a relic of the 18th century."
The former justice wrote that the Second Amendment was "understood as not placing any limit on either federal or state authority to enact gun control legislation." Interpretation of the amendment, however, has since been twisted to fit the beliefs of pro-gun groups like the National Rifle Association, Stevens wrote.
The NRA was given “a propaganda weapon of immense power” when the Supreme Court ruled in 2008 that the Second Amendment protected an individual’s right to bear arms. Stevens was one of four justices to dissent from the court’s opinion.
"Overturning that decision via a constitutional amendment to get rid of the Second Amendment would be simple and would do more to weaken the NRA's ability to stymie legislative debate and block constructive gun control legislation than any other available option," Stevens wrote.
Stevens is a lifelong Republican who was known for making more liberal-leaning decisions while on the Supreme Court bench, according to CNN. He was nominated to the high court by Republican President Gerald Ford and succeeded by Elena Kagan, who was chosen by Democratic President Barack Obama, Politico reported.
Hundreds of thousands of people protested across the country Saturday in the wake of a shooting at Florida's Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School that left 17 people dead on Valentine's Day. The student-led “March for Our Lives” movement seeks legislative action on the issues of gun violence and gun control.
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