EDITORIAL: Former Supreme Court justice seeks to rewrite the Bill of Rights.

Progressives have long had a love-hate relationship — mostly hate — with the U.S. Constitution and its checks on state power. And in these turbulent times, they’re becoming increasingly aggressive in their calls to fundamentally alter the nation’s founding document.

On Tuesday, retired U.S. Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens called for the repeal of the Second Amendment. In an essay posted on The New York Times website, Justice Stevens called the amendment a “relic of the 18th century.” He urged the student protesters to set their sights higher than simply imposing additional regulations on gun ownership, arguing that nullifying the amendment “would do more to weaken the NRA’s ability to stymie legislative debate and block constructive gun control legislation than any other available option.”

Justice Stevens, you might recall, authored the dissent in the 2008 Heller case, in which the majority justices recognized the obvious: The Second Amendment bestows an individual right to bear arms. Although he was named to the court in 1975 by Republican President Gerald Ford, Justice Stevens migrated left and became a reliable liberal vote until his 2010 retirement. He has previously advocated for more gun control, so his op-ed should come as no surprise.

But give Justice Stevens credit. At least he’s finally being honest about the issue and advocating a constitutionally endorsed solution for change — in contrast to those who would rather pressure the courts to neuter the Constitution through dubious judicial interpretations intended to achieve political ends.

Repeal the Second Amendment? The Constitution lays out the process. Those who would forbid the private ownership of firearms in the United States are certainly free to pursue such an option. Good luck.

And don’t be misled into thinking that the left’s increasing hostility to the Bill of Rights is limited to the Second Amendment. Free expression is under siege on many college campuses, thanks to progressive agitators. Meanwhile, scores of Democratic officeholders and candidates have embraced a move to rewrite the First Amendment to outlaw certain types of political speech.

They seek to overturn the Supreme Court’s 2010 Citizens United decision and allow federal bureaucrats to regulate campaign discourse by limiting independent political expenditures. It’s worth noting that during oral arguments a lawyer for the government admitted that, under the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law, the federal government was free to ban certain books, political pamphlets and other forms of expression.

Still, the four liberal high court justices later inexplicably voted to sanction such censorship as consistent with the First Amendment. The author of that minority opinion? Justice John Paul Stevens.