Story highlights The news organization makes an impassioned call for firearms regulations

The Times: America's gun proliferation is "a moral outrage and national disgrace"

(CNN) The recent spate of mass shootings has moved The New York Times to a measure it has not taken since 1920: a front-page editorial.

The piece's online subtitle summarizes its message: "It is a moral outrage and national disgrace that civilians can legally purchase weapons designed to kill people with brutal speed and efficiency."

The editorial criticizes the gun debate in America that tenaciously parses the wording of the Second Amendment, the right to bear arms, and politicians who repeatedly utter condolences and prayers but do nothing to reduce the vast proliferation of guns.

The opinion particularly focuses on "slightly modified combat rifles," saying they "must be outlawed for civilian ownership."