Hours after Tuesday's shooting at an Oregon high school where a teen gunmen shot a 14-year-old male student dead and injured a teacher before reportedly killing himself, President Barack Obama rebuked members of Congress for its failure to pass comprehensive firearm legislation.

In his remarks, the president insisted that the congressional members are "terrified" of upsetting the National Rifle Association and argued that there is more support to protect the Second Amendment than protecting the lives of citizens, according to Al Jazeera America.

"We're the only developed country on earth where this happens," President Obama said. "And it happens now once a week. And it's a one-day story. There's no place else like this."

There have been 74 school shootings, including Tuesday's, since the Newtown, Connecticut shooting in December 2012 when 20 children and six teachers were murdered by a young man with an assault rifle.

"I have been in Washington for a while now, and most things don't surprise me," Obama said. "The fact that 20 six-year-olds were gunned down in the most violent fashion possible and this town couldn't do anything about it was stunning to me."

While some states such as New York and Maryland passed laws restricting access to military-grade assault weapons, others including Georgia passed laws that loosened restrictions to purchase weapons, Al Jazeera reported.

On the other side of the debate stand gun lobbyists and gun rights advocates who insist that restrictions to firearms would harm the American public, as only criminals would gain access to guns. Many also argue that the main problem with the mass shootings is mental health as opposed to a gun problem.

"The United States does not have a monopoly on crazy people," the president said. "It's not the only country that has psychosis ... And yet we kill each other in these mass shootings at rates that are exponentially higher than anyplace else. Well, what's the difference? The difference is, is that these guys can stack up a bunch of ammunition in their houses. And that's sort of par for the course."

Obama noted that when a 28-year-old gunman killed 35 people in Port Arthur, Australia in 1996, the government imposed stricter policies for gun ownership while some Australian citizens voluntarily turned over the guns they already owned, according to Al Jazeera.

"Australia just said, 'Well, that's it. We're not doing, we're not seeing that again,' and basically imposed very severe, tough gun laws, and they haven't had a mass shooting since. I mean, our levels of gun violence are off the charts," Obama said. "There's no advanced, developed country on earth that would put up with this."