MIAMI - The March for Our Lives demonstration in Washington, after the Valentine's Day massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, prompted 98-year-old retired Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens to write a letter to the Editor of the New York Times[1].
"Rarely in my lifetime have I seen the type of civic engagement school children and their supporters demonstrated in Washington and other major cities throughout the country," Stevens said.
His letter was published just three days after the March for Our Lives when hundreds of thousands of protestors took the streets all over the country to demand gun control after a disturbed 19-year-old former student used an AR-15 rifle to kill 17 -- 14 students and three teachers.
Stevens called for more than gun control. He took on the Second Amendment and it wasn't the first time. The self-described judicial conservative appointed by President Gerald Ford in 1975 wrote the dissenting opinion in the District of Columbia v. Heller[2]. The landmark 2008 Supreme Court decision that for first time, in the history of the constitution, held 5 to 4, that the second amendment protects a civilian's right to keep a hand gun at home for self defense.
Stevens maintains that the Second Amendment was never intended to be about an individuals right to bear arms, but rather the collective right of those individuals serving in state militias.
Here's exactly what the Second Amendment says:
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.
Stevens thinks the Second Amendment had a much more limited purpose and it has been distorted by the National Rifle Association and many people who are
