John Paul Stevens Quotes
District of Columbia v. Heller, which recognized an individual right to possess a firearm under the Constitution, is unquestionably the most clearly incorrect decision that the Supreme Court announced during my tenure on the bench.
Stevens, John Paul. The Making of a Justice: Reflections on My First 94 Years. Little, Brown and Company, 2019.
The Southern Rebels who insisted on their right to have guns during Reconstruction, viciously denied that same right to the newly freed slaves. Sickles tried to remedy this, but the KKK and other terrorists intimidated most of the Blacks into not using the right that they had. Later, they would do that with the right to vote.
John Paul Stevens was an American lawyer and jurist who served as an associate justice of the United States Supreme Court from 1975 until his voluntary retirement in 2010. At the time of his retirement, he was the second-oldest-serving justice in the history of the court and the third-longest-serving justice. At the time of his death, he was the longest lived Supreme Court justice ever. His long tenure saw him write for the court on most issues of American law, including civil liberties, death penalty, government action and intellectual property. In cases involving presidents of the United States, he wrote for the court that they were to be held accountable under American law. A registered Republican when appointed who throughout his life identified as a conservative, Stevens was considered to have been on the liberal side of the court at the time of his retirement.
