I agree with your assessment that it could work but probably won't work but not for the same reason you advance. The idea of moving the fight to the state legislatures is to do battle on more favorable ground, where the same forces which overcome us in Washington are not so strong.
That is not to say that state legislators have more virtue than federal legislators, I believe they are equally corrupt but they are corrupted in a different way. We don't escape human nature by moving the battle to the state legislatures we simply fight a different kind of war and with a different set of players.
The real appeal to them is the same appeal in Washington, to acquire power. To get that power they will have to take it away from Washington and bring it home. It will divide power and restore Montesquieu's vision of separation of powers.
Even so, I am pessimistic unless we are visited by a Black Swan which breaks open the box we are in.
