Constitution is an outlandish idea, and amending it is simple common sense," Lummis, a former professor at Tsuda College in Tokyo and a staunch supporter of the current Constitution, said via e-mail. "But a large portion of the public is not buying that, as opinion polls show the percentage of people supporting Article 9 is increasing."
Article 9 renounces war.
Lummis first came to Okinawa with the U.S. Marine Corps in 1960. He later became a leading opponent of the Vietnam War. A veteran of the Free Speech Movement at Berkeley, Calif., in the mid-1960s, he returned to Japan and formed the group Gaijin Beheiren, which was associated with Beheiren, the nationwide movement that author Makoto Oda founded to help American soldiers who did not want to go to Vietnam.
Gaijin Beheiren's activities included participating in Beheiren's rallies, producing pamphlets and leaflets in English that were passed out to antiwar GIs, and protesting the war at the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo.