As a father and grandfather, I could not help but be moved by the national March for our Lives. I was moved by more than just the dedication of these high school students to ban assault rifles and to eliminate once and for all the mass murders that have happened all too often in public places in America over the past 20 years. 

What struck me most profoundly was the commitment these students showed to our Constitutional system and democracy.  They are not seeking to achieve their goals through civil disobedience.  They are planning to mobilize the power of their generation at the ballot box.   

These high school students have been classified as Generation Z, those potential future voters born after 2000.  And as shown by the polls, they will have the support of the Millennials- those voters born between 1980 and 2001.  The assault weapons issue is both the unifying and galvanizing factor of these two generations of voters. 

I can only ask:  Where are the Republican office holders, who have been conspicuous by their absence from this past weekend’s marches? 

The answer is not a mystery.  By and large, they have been cowed into silence by President Donald Trump and the National Rifle Association (NRA).  They are terrified that both Trump and the NRA, who are anathema to the Millennials and Generation Z, will target them for defeat in primary contests. And I concede that the money and fundraising power of the NRA is real. 

There are a growing number of Republicans who, like me, believe in the Second Amendment but also the 2008 U.S. Supreme Court decision in the case of District of Columbia v. Heller, which elucidated the Amendment’s historic and Constitutional meaning.  The case opinion, issued by the late conservative Justice Antonin Scalia, held that Second Amendment guarantees the rights of citizens to purchase and own weapons which are necessary for traditional lawful purposes, such as self-defense and hunting.  Such weapons would include handguns and hunting rifles.  It is obvious that the decision does not establish or protect a right to own and use semi-automatic assault weapons, which are unnecessary and inapplicable for either of these two purposes. 

So I must say to my fellow Republicans who adhere to the Heller decision:  The GOP is on the wrong side of history.  The future of the party is endangered by the wholesale rejection of the Republican brand by Millennials and Generation Z voters.  At what point will you repudiate the influence of Trumpism and the NRA by joining with this past weekend’s marchers and supporting the abolition of private ownership and use of assault weapons? 

Trump troglodytes and NRA gun worshippers prefer that Republicans forget that Ronald Reagan, a conservative president of true goodness and greatness, in 1991, two years after he left office endorsed the Brady bill. 

Named for Reagan’s press secretary, Jim Brady, disabled for life in the 1981 Reagan assassination attempt, this legislation, in its original form endorsed by Reagan, would have 1) established a national seven-day waiting period before a handgun purchaser could take delivery; and 2) allowed local law enforcement officials to do background checks for criminal records or known histories of mental disturbances. Those with such records would be prohibited from buying the handguns. 

The bill was enacted in 1993 and further amended in 1998.  Nevertheless, the fact remains that Reagan had the courage to take on the NRA, while most Republicans acted like poltroons when confronted by this gun lobby. 

If Republicans continue to be cowed by the NRA and fail to follow the Reaganite example of political valor, they will pay a fearful price in future elections, as Millennial and Generation Z voters reject wholesale the Republican brand, even in Red states.  I continue to stay loyal to the Republican brand out of loyalty to two of our greatest presidents, Dwight David Eisenhower and Ronald Reagan.  The cause, however, may be hopeless in view of the malignancies of Trumpism and the NRA on the Republican body politic. 

If, as I fear the Republican Party disintegrates due to Trump and the NRA, the only solution may be a new center-right party, built upon the ashes of the Republican Party.  This has happened in American history before – the Republican Party established in the 1850s was built upon the ashes of the Whigs.   

When the late Senate Republican Minority Leader Everett Dirksen announced his support for the Civil Rights Act of 1964, he quoted Victor Hugo and stated, “Nothing is more powerful than an idea whose time has come.”  If Republicans fail to realize that a ban on assault weapons is such an idea, the future of the GOP will be imperiled.  Thus, the time for a new center-right party may be coming sooner than we think. 

Alan J. Steinberg served as Regional Administrator of Region 2 EPA during the administration of former President George W. Bush and as Executive Director of the New Jersey Meadowlands Commission under former New Jersey Governor Christie Whitman.