Posted on 02/12/2014 7:22:50 AM PST by GILTN1stborn
Great news! Thanks to your calls and letters, the Florida Judiciary Committee passed the COS application earlier this morning.
The vote was a bipartisan 7-2. You can watch the video or listen to the audio here. You can also email and call members of the committee by referencing our previous blog post.
Here’s how everyone voted.
In Favor: •Sen. Lee •Sen. Soto •Sen. Bradley •Sen. Gardiner •Sen. Latvala •Sen. Richter •Sen. Thrasher
Opposed: •Sen. Ring •Sen. Joyner
Congratulations to our team in Florida for a job well done. And thanks to our team across the country for lending their support at a critical moment.
We’re one step closer to preserving liberty in our country.
#conventionofstates ping
I’m not so sure a convention is a good idea considering the weak leadership and lack of conservative organization.
The train is starting to roll!!
We have the growing Convention of States movement that was secured for us by Article V of the Constitution. Those that wish to ignore this firm element of our country's founding a deserving of the tyranny that is surely coming our way.
A convention is no guarantee of avoiding the tyranny. To state that not supporting a convention is deserving is a horrendous attitude and tyrannical itself.
Article V ping.
Opposed: •Sen. Ring •Sen. Joyner
Any idea what the R/D breakdown is in that group?
Here is a guarantee: America is a police state now. The law is what Obama says it is.
Reform cannot emerge from DC, from the people who profit so well from our corrupted system.
There are explanatory resources at COS.com all should take advantage of. First and foremost is the plain fact that our Framers bequeathed Article V for precisely the situation we find ourselves in. Our sovereignty has been stolen, it is time to reclaim it.
Article V ping!
*** BEGIN ***
The amendatory process under Article V consists of three steps: Proposal, Disposal, and Ratification.
Proposal:
There are two ways to propose an amendment to the Constitution.
Article V gives Congress and an Amendments Convention exactly the same power to propose amendments, no more and no less.
Disposal:
Once Congress, or an Amendments Convention, proposes amendments, Congress must decide whether the states will ratify by the:
The State Ratifying Convention Method has only been used twice: once to ratify the Constitution, and once to ratify the 21st Amendment repealing Prohibition.
Ratification:
Depending upon which ratification method is chosen by Congress, either the state legislatures vote up-or-down on the proposed amendment, or the voters elect a state ratifying convention to vote up-or-down. If three-quarters of the states vote to ratify, the amendment becomes part of the Constitution.
Forbidden Subjects:
Article V contains two explicitly forbidden subjects and one implicitly forbidden subject.
Explicitly forbidden:
Implicity forbidden:
I have two reference works for those interested.
The first is from the American Legislative Exchange Council, a conservative pro-business group. This document has been sent to every state legislator in the country.
Proposing Constitutional Amendments by a Convention of the States: A Handbook for State Lawmakers
The second is a 1973 report from the American Bar Association attempting to identify gray areas in the amendatory process to include an Amendments Convention. It represents the view of the ruling class of 40 years ago. While I dislike some of their conclusions, they have laid out the precedents that may justify those conclusions. What I respect is the comprehensive job they did in locating all the gray areas. They went so far as to identify a gray area that didn't pop up until the Equal Rights Amendment crashed and burned a decade later. Even if you find yourself in disagreement with their vision, it's worth reading to see the view of the ruling class toward the process.
Report of the ABA Special Constitutional Convention Study Committee
Conservatives are overwhelmingly stronger at the state level than at the federal level. Article V takes place at the state level with a bare bones administrative role of the federal government.
There is no way the Left can control an Article V COS.
Wyoming neuters New York.
Kansas neuters California.
You get the idea.
The Left does not have the numbers in the conservative states and states are far more conservative in number than liberal.
We can expect the Left, Soros, Bloomberg to throw massive funds into conservative states but it will not work. The grassroots in conservative states do not and will not trust liberal intruders.
It takes 2/3s of states to pass an amendment and 3/4s to ratify it. No danger of a runaway convention.
And it’s a convention to propose amendments to the existing Constitution. It is not a Constitutional Convention which would draw up a new constitution.
Try getting an amendment through to repeal the 2nd Amendment. Not going to happen.
Remember, it’s not dependent on the number of voters, it is dependent on the number of states.
Joyner and Ring are both democrats and Joyner is an embarrassment to the state.
That language in Article V pertains to Congress, but not to an Amendments Convention. If you read the ABA document, the authors point out that an Amendments Convention possesses enough sovereignty to decide its own rules for passing an amendment to Congress for disposal and then to the states for ratification. The Convention can choose a two-thirds threshold for reporting out an amendment, but it does not have to. I believe that even the ALEC document concurs on this.
Great news, Thanks Bay!
Obama already ignores the constitution. So we’re going to call a ConCon to write more amendments for him to ignore?
We at least have the cover of the actual document right now. We have the Bill of Rights. Opening a convention could remove that cover. This is a gigantic can of worms.
This won’t fix dimmo arrogance if they control at least the House or the Senate. The only fix for that is elections. And if our depraved fellow Americans keep electing depraved dimmos, the problem will never be solved peacefully.
The 2/3rds requirement is for Congress to pass an amendment, but it is also for the states to call for a convention to propose amendments. As you point out, the 2/3rds number is not for the convention to pass an amendment; that is up to the convention to decide. It is only the threshold for Congress to call the convention in the first place.
-PJ
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