Posted on 06/07/2013 8:39:41 AM PDT by Jacquerie
Conservatives tout the importance of the traditional family to our society. Father, mother, children, the family is the building block, the foundation of society. This isn’t news to any civilization. Radical Leftists tell us it doesn’t matter. A family is whatever one or two or more people of any sex wish it to be. After almost fifty years of the Great Society, in which many fathers were replaced with a monthly stipend to mothers, we conservatives know the results. Directionless, violent and barbaric boys grow into felonious men. Absent the proven institution, the structure of traditional marriage, women still have babies, but our culture and civilization suffer. We know this.
Focus on the importance of structure, and apply it to political science, to American history.
In 1776, thirteen American colonies declared independence. Just a few months before the last great battle of the ensuing war, in March 1781, they formalized a quasi-government under the Articles of Confederation. By 1787, it was clear enough the Union was dissolving. The structure of the Articles was insufficient to provide good government. Twelve of the thirteen states sent delegates to a convention to correct its inherent, structural problems. After a summer of effort, they devised a new plan ratified by the people of eleven states within a year.
Structure. There was little difference between the morals and attitudes of the people who drafted the Articles and the Constitution. Indeed, some of the same men who signed the Articles, also signed the Constitution. What changed was the structure of the American government.
The American Union, teetering back on its heels under the Articles, thrived when released by the Constitution. The more perfect union of the Constitution set the stage for freedom and prosperity. A largely agricultural backwater in 1789 grew to become a solid second tier industrial and economic powerhouse in less than a hundred years.
Structure. Just as non-traditional “families” are unnatural and destructive, the Articles of Confederation demonstrated that governments not sufficiently divided into their natural functions were inherently unstable and ineffective. The American Constitutional Union, like the timeless husband/wife/children familial structure, recognized the natural structure of free government.
That natural structure meant separation of powers, and not just the civics class horizontal legislative/executive/judicial. The first, and most important separation was the vertical division of powers between the federal government and states, as enforced by a Senate of the States. In this all important structure, state participation meant a federal government and court system well-confined to enumerated powers and one that respected the Tenth Amendment.
Structure is destiny. The 17th Amendment removed the states from the federal government. In their stead, it created another popularly elected body. Make no mistake, the new Senate beginning in 1913 is a monster, a political Frankenstein that combines the worst of long termed popularly elected politicians with incredible power tied to the executive branch.
As the modern Left redefined and corrupted the natural order, the structure of family, the Left of a hundred years ago did the same to federated, free government. Restoration of republican freedom is impossible without rebuilding the Framers’ structure, and that requires a Senate of the States. The 17th must go.
Bull.
Only after the 17th did power consolidate in DC.
It gave us Wickard v. Filburn, a federal court system hostile to retained state powers, "unfunded mandates," and top down agencies like the EPA and department of non-education that push the states around.
Madison and the Framers were well aware of man's fallen nature. The system they set up countered interest with another interest. The feds v. the states were supposed to be in tension; they were. By that tension, neither the states nor feds could seriously affect our freedoms.
You still haven't answered my question, presumably because you can't.
I have NEVER predicted rainbows and lollipops upon repeal of the 17th. Repeal is a necessary first step to correct the damage done by a hundred years of demagogic senators.
If there is to be any good to come from the reign of this incredible impostor, let it be that the States re-assert their sovereign rights.
Fasten seat belts. Bumpy decade coming up!
What? No, the Senate is supposed to be representative of the States themselves, not the people of those States — the people are already represented via the Representatives. Moving the selection/appointment of Senator from the State to the people thereof makes the States themselves impotent in the federal system, thereby making the States into mere extensions of the FedGov (which is why there's been so little blowback against some truly horrendous actions in the Federal government); consider, for example, the evil of incorporation:
What we have in incorporation is the ability of the court to take the Constitution, apply some magical transformation, and then use that to constrain the States - a prime example being the 1st Amendment, by incorperating it against the States the courts magically transform 'Congress' to mean 'legislature' and then apply that to the states. In so doing they become not Judges, but lawgivers [a legislature in itself].
This usurpation is of course the seed which grew into Roe v. Wade where the USSC repealed all States's abilities to govern their own citizens [the unborn].
So there is a chamber were each state is equally represented irrespective of population. Do you really “question that purpose” Repeal the 17th? Add in other reasons you want 2 chambers instead of 1 (so legislation can’t just get rammed though). Are you being simple?
You Jacquerie continue to live in fantasy world if you think career politicians will choose better Senators, they won’t, period. The system was wrought with corruption and delays with seats sitting empty for months, that’s why they changed it.
I think the founders GOT IT RIGHT BIG TIME when they stuck in the provision that allowed you to amend the constitution. Thank goodness we passed a bill of rights, fixed the Presidential election process so it didn’t always end in a tie (1800) ect. Aside from prohibition and the income tax (and giving DC electors for President) I think we’ve done a pretty good job making positive changes.
I am forceful on this issue for good reason, I and millions of others live in rat county (don’t tell to move, save it). My vote for US House is meaningless. You want to disenfranchise me and take away my only vote for Congress that matters and give the power to a bunch of g*d-damn politicians. Politicians of both parties are pond scum, in every state, even Texas and Utah are filled with RINO slime. David Dewhurst would be the Senator for Texas now instead of Ted Cruz whom the people chose.
I will continue to oppose this ridiculous idea of giving my right to vote back to state legislators even though it apparently means saying the same thing over and over and over and over and over and over again.
I would advise you that it’s never gonna happen Jacquerie so you are wasting your time. I guess I am too but I can’t stand the proliferation of ignorance in pushing this dumb idea.
Really ? That seems to be your stock-in-trade.
"Repeal is a necessary first step to correct the damage done by a hundred years of demagogic senators."
You keep telling yourself that. We'd be lucky to have a Senate that wasn't substantially worse than the one at present, lined with party hacks thoroughly unaccountable to the people (nevermind the Constitution). Not a single Ted Cruz amongst them.
Except they wouldn’t be representatives of the states... they’d be representatives of the national parties. You’d have an even stronger, concerted and unprecedented effort to anoint state legislators by the national parties in order to get the hacks they want, both in the state capitols and in DC. The 17th came into being because of the corruption and unaccountability that was already audacious in that body by the end of the 19th century.
And you are missing a key constitutional point. The 17th emasculated a key power of the sovereign states.
The pre-17th Senators were usually as corrupt a bunch'o'hacks as we have today. The difference is that they were sent there by State Legislatures, who at least had some oversight of their hacks. So they were less likely to pontificate on matters that did not immediately concern their state. They were held much more accountable than they are today. Furthermore, a Senator did not have to be rich to be elected by the legislature. Of course, it wouldn't hurt.
Popularly elected Senators now seem to quickly become creatures of the Federal Government. Safe in six-year seats, they ignore their constituents at no particular peril. E.G., Feinstein and Boxer? Both have become worth HUNDREDS of millions of dollars in office.
Pull up a post of mine where I remotely said anything like that. You cannot.
You think your senators are responsible to the people? They are responsible to their political parties. Repeal the 17th and they would once again be responsible to their states.
Your rat assemblymen would not suffer senators who did not look out for their state’s interests. As you say, period.
Baloney.
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Democrats (and RINOs) and I DIFFER HEAVILY ON WHAT OUR STATE'S INTERESTS ARE. And by the way NONE OF THEM OPPOSE FEDERAL POWER (unless it's used for good like banning queer marriage). This is part of your fantasy.
Jeez. The problem is socialism and what is called "liberalism" not how Senators are elected.
Federal government is oppressive. State government is oppressive. Local government is oppressive.
O quite agree. But how exactly are we to make sure that our representatives represent us? Well, the FF's thought that if we elect the state reps for short terms, we could punish them for selecting the wrong Senators.
Federal government is oppressive. State government is oppressive. Local government is oppressive.
Gosh. Agree again. So did the FFs, who wanted to keep (IMNVHO) the levers of elective power as close to home as possible, so the oppressor at the local level had to be very accessible. (If it weren't for TV and the Internet, more of these local yokels would be assuming ambient temperature more frequently)
Problem: We have grown a sort of governmental cancer. That is, the bureaucracies that rule us, soldier on no matter who is in office, and can themselves "reward" the behavior they want from the elected. Their money must be taken away.
Virginia is a perfect example of what the repeal of the 17th amendment would do. Va would have 2 Republican Senators right now if the 17th was ditched.
A couple of statist Federal bootlicking pimps hate your idea of repealing the 17th. I guess you are doing a good thing, keep it up. Bravo Zulu.
Liberalism is certainly a problem. It was fertilized and nurtured by the rush of progressive amendments/mistakes a hundred years ago.
Question: What is the probability a president would bother to nominate judges to federal benches who had shown hostility to the 10th Amendment? Why would a senate of the states even consider them?
BTW, spare me your silly theatrics. They have no effect.
The final option is always available, secession.
Well, that would be a good thing, although I am not that sold on the benefits of the GOP to our republic.
Today’s Senate is the plaything of Obama. Any rat senator up for reelection in 2014 doesn’t dare to cross Obama or Dingy Harry. To do so means maybe a primary challenger and certainly no $ from the DNC or major rat deep-pockets. Popularly elected rat senators are entirely responsible to populist Obama for continuance in office.
I imagine the return to a Senate of the States in which members don’t give a rip what Obama, CNN, MSNBC, WaPO, NYT . . . have to say.
Democracy is killing our republic.
Yeah, 2 leftist RINO big gubmint hacks. But you’ve been told that repeatedly.
Agree, hopefully after attempting other options.
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