As Sen. Edward Kennedy is buried today in Massachusetts, the elaborate ceremony is more than a faraway spectacle for local attorney Steve Thornton. It drives recollection of the Ted Kennedy he knew, if only at a distance, through weeks of mutual work on a law review article.

Thornton, then a 23-year-old student and law review editor at the Salmon P. Chase College of Law at Northern Kentucky University, turned Kennedy’s landmark April 6, 1981, Senate speech on gun control into the lead article for an issue focusing on the Second Amendment.

“It was a great opportunity for me, and I just never will forget it,” Thornton said.

That speech came just a week after President Ronald Reagan was shot by John Hinckley Jr., using a handgun Hinckley had bought at a pawnshop for $47.

The 1982 issue of the Northern Kentucky Law Review ascribes “The Handgun Crime Control Act of 1981” to Sen. Edward M. Kennedy. But a footnote on the first page credits the future Bowling Green attorney.

“Our gratitude is extended to Associate Editor Steven O. Thornton who was responsible for transforming this speech into proper law review form, a task involving many hours of research,” it says.

Thornton said he spoke to Kennedy many times over the weeks of work he put in to the article. He wanted to make sure he understood Kennedy’s speech, and certainly wanted assurance that he got everything right, he said.

One point of commonality that Kennedy quickly seized upon was U.S. Rep. William Natcher, who represented this area for 40 years until his 1994 death. Kennedy and Natcher were both Democrats, but Natcher was far more conservative than the famously liberal Kennedy. Yet Kennedy repeatedly said that he liked and respected Natcher, Thornton said. That was his first experience with powerful figures who liked each other despite great ideological differences, he said. Thornton said he was reminded of those conversations this week as many top Republicans paid tribute to Kennedy.

Since finishing that article 27 years ago, Thornton had not spoken with Kennedy, he said. Now that the 77-year-old senator is gone, Thornton said he wishes they’d talked more, but knew that the senior senator from Massachusetts had many more important things to do. It’s sad to see the apparent end of a political dynasty that had such an impact on the last few generations, Thornton said.

Their mutual law review article was a memorable achievement for him, he said; most such articles are quickly shelved, of interest only to academics, but that issue drew lots of outside attention because the Second Amendment right to bear arms is so contentious.

Thornton’s hand is visible in the article’s heavy footnotes, giving specific examples and deep background on Kennedy’s statements, including Hinckley’s low-price handgun purchase and many statistics on crime and gun ownership, outlines of related laws and a breakdown of opinion polls.

Kennedy’s speech called for the restriction of cheap, easily available handguns, and denounced the National Rifle Association for repeatedly obstructing such gun control measures. Opponents of gun control had spread rumors that Kennedy sought to ban hunting rifles as well, he said. His legislative proposal would neither ban sporting rifles and pistols nor keep families from having a gun in the home for self-defense, Kennedy said.

He suggested banning “Saturday night specials,” cheap handguns that could be bought on impulse. Kennedy’s bill would have required a 21-day waiting period on handgun purchases for background checks, and banned gun sales at pawnshops.

Among a number of other provisions, his bill would have required gun manufacturers to keep detailed records of production, and owners to report loss or theft.

Many of those ideas eventually made their way into the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act of 1993, named for James Brady, Reagan’s press secretary. Brady was shot in the head by Hinckley and suffered serious brain damage, confining him to a wheelchair, but he and his wife became outspoken advocates for gun control.

Some of Kennedy’s proposals were altered, such as reducing the waiting period to five days, a requirement that lapsed in 1998 when it became possible to do immediate background checks by computer.