Posted on 04/15/2014 9:36:54 AM PDT by Strawberry AZ
Article V ping.
When will you (all) understand...
They don’t care what you think, or about what you want.
They know what they want to do, and how, and you (all) are an annoyance that must be “handled” somehow, but essentially ignored.
Top to bottom, from the City Council, to WASHDC, they all know what they plan to accomplish, how all the interests combine, and how to line their own pockets as luxuriously as possible, while putting it all over on you.
...with vanishingly few exceptions. Top to bottom, the entire system is corrupted and seduced.
I am saddened by this vision, but unfortunately I think it’s accurate — and more so each day.
so, do nothing?
What then, is the solution?
Are Americans capable of free, self government? Should we accept Washington, DC tyranny? Are we suited for nothing better?
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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:
Implicitly 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
It’s my understanding we’re a long way from the 34 states required. AZ should’ve been the 34th state, but it’s my understanding that 12 states have rescinded their previous desire for a convention. So we’re at 22 states.
The movement for an Amendments Convention to consider a balanced budget amendment started back in the Eighties and has now reached 34 states. But some of those petitions have been rescinded. Others have been rescinded by one legislature and resubmitted by a later legislature. The Archivist of the United States is the point of capture for petitions, but Congress is the judge of validity and timeliness.
If there is an agreement in Congress that there are 34 valid and timely petitions for an Amendments Convention to consider a balanced budget amendment, then accord to Hamilton's language in Federalist #85, Congress has a sworn duty to set a time and place for that convention.
The convention, by long-established principles of contract law, would be forbidden to consider anything outside the purview of a balanced budget amendment. That would forbid consideration of Mark Levin's wider scope, worthy though it is.
A newer movement to call an Amendments Convention to consider Levin's wider scope has but one state sending a petition to Congress as of this date.
BTTT!
If our “leaders” will not obey the constitution now, what is the likelehood they will obey it in the future?
The problem resides with the politicians and those who interpet it, not the document itself.
But the Constitution they obey is the Living Constitution, the Constitution as a tree, the Constitution that changes and evolves even though the words don't change, the Constitution of penumbras and emanations.
When the federal entity sets up a legacy of case law that enshrines the Living Constitution, it the option and duty of the states to sharpen the language in the Constitution to prevent the manufacture of further penumbras and emanations.
This is why an Amendments Convention is so important. It is how the states propose amendments to force the federal entity to behave, lest that disobedience sever the last remaining bonds between the government and the people.
As far as having the requisite numbers to force the call, you're right. And actually, we're a lot farther away than that.
The last time I checked, there are 8 states that have successfully moved the Citizens for Self-Governance (CSG) Convention of States (COS) legislation through at least one chamber, plus Georgia which has passed it through both. Arizona is fighting to be the second, hopefully this week.
Still, that's not a bad tally for just 8 months since start-up of a process that we realistically expect to take from three to five years.
I'm afraid that those other numbers that you cite may have to do with another Article V proposal that is also working its way through the various legislatures of the several states. That would be the Compact for America (CFA) Balanced Budget Amendment (BBA).
As the name implies, that is a very promising single-issue proposal that has attracted more commitments than has the broader CSG COS. I am aware of that effort, but have not followed it closely enough to speak with any authority about the legislation's stipulations regarding passage and rescission. I do know that it's common practice in contract law, which is what the CFA BBA essentially is, to cover such contingencies, and I would be shocked to learn that something that basic would have been overlooked.
The best that I can do would be to refer you to their website: http://www.compactforamerica.org/
I agree with you, and so do the rest of the supporters of a Convention of States to propose amendments to the Constitution that will, among other things, clarify language in such clauses as Welfare and Commerce, drastically limiting if not eliminating the opportunity for liberal judicial interpretation.
Article V was written to provide the states with the authority to remedy federal overreach, by the legislative, by the executive, and most importantly, by the judicial.
My point is that there are places in the ammendments where the words “shall” and “shall not” are either ignored or disreguarded.(”It depends on what the definition of the word ‘is’ is.”)
The Constitution is not at fault, rather the blatant disreguard and misrepresentation of it.
The Constitution has become so distorted in interpretation and application that it has become at best ineffective in protecting liberty and at worst an instrument inflicting tyranny.
Nathan Bedford's second Maxim of the American Constitution:
The American Constitution is being amended everyday without the consent of the governed.
In order to believe that a Convention of the States presents a greater threat to liberty than our current state of politics one must believe:
1. The Constitution is not being amended by three women in black robes +1 liberal in black robes +1 swing vote on a case by case basis.
2. The Constitution is not being amended at the caprice of the president by executive order.
3. The Constitution is not being amended at the caprice of the president when he chooses which laws he will "faithfully" execute.
4. The Constitution is not being amended daily by regulation done by an unaccountable bureaucracy.
5. The Constitution is not being amended by simply being ignored.
6. The Constitution is not being amended by international treaty.
7. The Constitution is not being amended by Executive Order creating treaty powers depriving citizens of liberty as codified in the Bill of Rights.
8. The Constitution is not being amended by international bureaucracies such as, UN, GATT, World Bank, etc.
9. The Constitution is not being amended by the Federal Reserve Bank without reference to the will of the people.
10. The federal government under our current "constitutional" regime has suddenly become capable of reforming itself, balancing the budget and containing the debt.
11. The national debt of the United States is sustainable and will not cause the American constitutional system and our economy to crash and with them our representative democracy, the rule of law, and the Constitution, such as it is, itself.
12. The Republican Party, presuming it gains a majority in the House and the Senate and gains the White House, will now do what is failed to do even under Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush and balance the budget, reduce the debt, stop regulating, reform the tax system, end crony capitalism, appoint judges who will not betray us and, finally, listen to the people.
13. That a runaway Convention of the States will occur, that it will persuade the delegates from conservative states, that it will be ratified by three quarters of the states' legislatures among whom conservatives control a majority, and the end result will somehow be worse than what we have now.
14. If we do nothing everything will be fine; if we keep doing what we have been doing everything will be fine; we have all the time in the world.
V
Impeccably flawless...
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