Posted on 03/14/2015 8:43:48 AM PDT by Strawberry AZ
Of the many people I've met over the last two years who are opponents of an Article V Convention of States to Propose Amendments to the Constitution, one of my greatest regrets is that there are many with whom I would most likely agree on virtually every other issue in modern-day political discourse. Many of them, however, almost proudly admit that their positions on a COS are rooted in a decades-old fear of the unknown and an inability to trust their fellow citizens, while most COS proponents put their faith in stringent, new safeguards and an optimistic view of the future. The irony of it all is that we are ostensibly striving for the same outcome… a safer, stronger, more democratic republic of sovereign states.
I am corresponding with one such COS opponent who is involved in an eMail campaign in another state, attempting to defeat our COS legislation. I’ve told him that I cannot wish him good luck in his attempt to scuttle the efforts of good, strong, constitutionalists who only want a free and open national debate in a forum guaranteed to introduce conservatism and Originalist thinking to a public starved for such concepts, starved intentionally by a left-leaning media. I hear opponents of a COS deride their fellow citizens for not having sufficient knowledge in civic matters, rendering them unqualified, the opponents say, to participate in something as critical as the amendment process, while they themselves blindly follow an outdated strategy of obstructionism that prevents the public from receiving the very education that they say is lacking. I find no sound logic in that, nor do I see a genuine concern for educating the public. I see a smoke screen, a straw man, an excuse to justify their knee-jerk resistance.
A national forum such as a COS would not only garner wall-to-wall attention from our own media, but from political observers the world over. We don't pretend to expect positive coverage from the Alphabet Networks, but the truth is that they no longer have a monopoly on the news. Even negative coverage of conservative principles is better than no coverage at all… it just might be enough to spark curiosity, to start people thinking, some of whom admittedly aren't accustomed to thinking for themselves.
If it makes them curious, then that’s good. Curious people do curious things… curious and predictable things. They will seek out the other side of the story… they will find FNC, they will find C-SPAN, they will find Drudge and Lucianne.com and Free Republic and Breitbart and Red State and countless Facebook pages and Twitter accounts where they will learn about the Founders' vision for America, unvarnished and unfiltered by Big Government or its lackeys in the public schools and in the mainstream press.
Just one hour of debate between an eloquent proponent of a balanced budget amendment and an equally passionate big spender would be the equivalent of a PhD in economics for the low-information viewer… and which argument do we honestly think would prevail with the majority?
Or, how about listening to a red state legislator who can clearly illustrate the terrible waste, fraud and abuse caused by overlapping and redundant federal, state and county regulations, one who is conversant in the Doctrine of Exclusive Jurisdiction and can elaborate on state sovereignty and the simplicity and efficiency of single-authority subject-matter jurisdiction… up against a less liberty-loving blue state delegate who finds himself in the untenable position of trying to justify federal intervention into matters such as public education, energy production, medical and health issues, possession and sale of firearms, land use and building codes, water resources, liability insurance, lending practices, and voting rights, just to name a few.
In trying to make the point that any effort to pass an amendment would be futile because our current crop of politicians would simply ignore it, my correspondent asked for an example of a proposed amendment that would “turn oathbreakers into oathkeepers,” which I took to mean cause legislators to live within the law, rather than above it. I provided him with the following list of just the raw topics, the headlines, if you will, of some of the various proposals that could be introduced and publicly debated at an amendments convention. I challenged him to try to think, as he read down the list, of the last time he heard any of these issues debated or even casually discussed in any kind of public forum, and to then think about the reaction that such ideas would invariably have across the vast majority of the Heartland.
Since he claimed to want public education, I provided him with a syllabus:
- A proposal to clarify the Necessary and Proper Clause, which authorizes Congress to enact laws that are "appropriate" and plainly adapted for carrying into execution Congress's enumerated powers; it does not authorize Congress to enact any law that Congress thinks is "reasonable." In other words, to invoke Necessary and Proper, a law must be "plainly adapted" to an enumerated end, a valid constitutional exercise of power by the Federal government.
- A proposal to reduce federal spending by clarifying the General Welfare Clause. The original view was that the federal government could not spend money on any issue that was naturally within the jurisdiction of the states.
- A proposal to reduce federal regulatory power by clarifying the Commerce Clause. The original view was that Congress was granted a narrow and exclusive power to regulate shipments across state lines - not ALL the economic activity of the entire nation.
- Similarly, as mentioned earlier, a proposal to establish the doctrine of Exclusive Jurisdiction, whereas one level of government - either state or federal, but not both - would have "subject matter jurisdiction" over any issue, eliminating overlapping and redundant regulation. If an issue can be properly and effectively regulated by the state, then the federal government would have no say in the matter.
- A proposal to prohibit the use of international treaties and international law to govern or guide the domestic law of the United States.
- A proposal to limit the use of Executive Orders and federal regulations to enact rules with the force of law, since the Constitution states clearly that Congress is to be the exclusive agency to enact laws.
- A proposal to impose mandatory lifetime term limits on members of Congress, all federal judges and justices of the Supreme Court.
- A proposal to require the sunset of all existing federal taxes, and require a super-majority vote of both chambers of Congress to re-instate or replace them.
- A proposal to outlaw "omnibus" bills, requiring only Single Subject bills.
- A proposal to repeal the Seventeenth Amendment so that our United States Senators once again represent and are answerable to our state legislators.
- And lastly, a Balanced Budget Amendment proposal requiring that the federal government spend no more than it takes in. The proposed amendment would also place an upper limit on federal taxation, requiring the states, not Congress, to ratify any request from the president for a debt ceiling increase. The proposal would redefine "debt" to include spending plus liabilities, would include an override waiver provision for national emergencies which would require a ¾ vote of Congress and would last for only one year. Any third consecutive National Emergency waiver would prohibit any member of that year's Congress from running for re-election.
But, since my questioner had asked for a single example, I told him that if I had to choose from that list just one proposal to be ratified as an amendment, one which would meet his requirement of turning “oathbreakers into oathkeepers,” it would have to be Term Limits.
The very prospect of an amendment to impose lifetime term limits on all federal officials is the primary reason that I support this movement. Since the Supreme Court ruled that the voters of a sovereign state don't have the right to impose term limits on their own locally-elected federal delegation, I can see no other way for us ever to bring an end to career politicians, including those who wear black robes to work.
Resolving that one issue, I believe, would go a very long way toward eliminating many of the most pressing issues that we face. Washington, DC, without a doubt, has become the most powerful and one of the most corrupt cities in the world, and no one who enters its enormous sphere of influence can help but be changed by it... and rarely for the better.
Virtually every politician's top priority, regardless of party, platform or principle, is to get re-elected. As soon as they arrive, they are surrounded by and steeped in the career mentality that pervades Washington, D.C. It is imposed on them, infused into them, particularly by the old dogs, the veterans, the party leaders, and soon the urgency of becoming a part of that culture of power supersedes anything they may have promised during their campaign. The wants and needs of the people who sent them there - the folks back home - all take a back seat to the new imperative - raise money for the Party, and ultimately for re-election.
In order for a newly elected candidate to maintain the party's financial support come election time, deals are made that have nothing to do with what's in the best interest of the voters back home. Legislation is passed at the direction of the party leadership, for instance, without a single legislator having read it. Does any of this sound anything like what the Founding Fathers had in mind when they coined the term, "Citizen Legislator"?
Meanwhile, we keep doing as we're told by The Establishment and the near-sighted automatons of The Eagle Forum and the John Birch Society… we throw the bums out… we vote in another conservative. We keep sending good people to Washington, only to see them disappear into the meat-grinder that is Congress, and come out the other side just so much baloney! If there were Term Limits and the candidate knew going in that their term was limited by constitutional edict, I firmly believe that they would think twice before casting a vote on legislation that could have a severe impact on the very communities to which they themselves will soon be returning… to live among the rest of us, to work at a job like a normal person again, outside of the Beltway Bubble, forced to bear the burden of whatever damned-fool laws Congress might pass with little or no concern for the unintended consequences they have on the daily lives of real people throughout this country.
And before anyone says that removing the "perks" of congressional service will cause a brain drain, and that no one of any consequence will want to run for an office that they can only hold for such a short amount of time, I would submit to you that if the folks up there running things right now are the best and the brightest that money, power and prestige can buy, then I think it's time for their de facto defenders, the opponents of a Convention of States, to open their eyes, join our ranks and help give some of us poor, stupid, uneducated people a chance… we couldn't possibly screw it up any worse!
And as for my anti-constitutionalist pen-pal, we truly are allies separated by a common goal.
Good post!
Congress has no more authority to modify or boot the powers loaned to it than a lawyer may assign a Power of Attorney.
I think that the constitutional republic needs to lose the idea of electing federal senators by either state lawmakers or general voters. State lawmakers need to take turns filling federal senate seats for their states.
While the states would have to keep their federal senate seats filled to comply with the Constitution’s Article V requirement of equal representation in the Senate, disgruntled voters would conceptually be able to use state recall laws to recall their federal senators, vacant federal senate seats filled simply by rotating in the next batch of state lawmakers.
<>State lawmakers need to take turns filling federal senate seats for their states.<>
Run with that idea. Elaborate into a stand alone vanity. Be sure to ping me when you do.
That will almost certainly be on the Article V agenda if it ever gets off the ground.
I should have included a “master reset” provision with respect to state lawmakers being rotated into federal Senate seats. In other words, in addition to state voters (state lawmakers?) possibly recalling bad-apple Senators, maybe a provision to allow 2/3 majority of states to remove a given federal senator.
Note that the states would be more closely involved with putting new justices on the Supreme Court with the “rotation” system. Letting the feds approve of justices is arguably the biggest mistake in the Constitution. And the ill-conceived 17th Amendment is always at the scene of Senate problems.
Again, the only reason that people are interested in controlling the federal government is because of the tsunami of unconstitutional federal taxes now going through DC.
I ran across this one back in the Eighties when it was called the Utah Option. (I have no idea how it may be related to the state of Utah.)
The idea was that if the legislatures of two-thirds of the states voted a Resolution of No-Confidence in the federal government, that federal government is dissolved. New elections would be called within 60 days for President, Vice-President, the House and all Senate seats regardless of two-year class. (This presupposes that the 17th Amendment is not repealed. If it is repealed, the states would replace all senators in whatever mode they saw fit.) There would be a Dracula Clause forbidding any member of the old government from serving in the new government.
Following the election, all federal judges would be fired and replaced by the new administration. All term and civil service protection would be revoked for all bureaucrats from the old administration.
This would be the ultimate reboot button short of revolution.
Putting on the tin foil hat, I trust that the Article V agenda is not being staged by Progressive Movement operatives who abort the mission at their convenience.
You should look into the Citizens for Self Governance, the group at the hear of this effort, and their Convention of States tab. They’re bona-fide freedom-loving American and the effort is a sincere one.
Would that would make the House closer to a parliamentary style body? If we raised the cap to, say, 600, that would be one Representative per roughly 515,000 people. Would that possibly be too many to divide roughly equally between two major parties? Would smaller caucuses emerge with more clout in numbers based on alliances that one not necessarily party-based?
That would force coalitions to emerge to select the Speaker. And the Speaker *should* drive the interests of the coalition that selected him (unlike today).
Then there is the Senate. It would still be capped at 100, and the two leading parties will still run it. They would be truly forced to deal with the House, because the House would likely not be run by party cronies like it is today, where both chambers act as essentially one body.
Then there is the Electoral College, which would grow to 700, which means that the President will need to get 351 electoral votes to win. The disbursement of those 600 district votes across the states will change what we think of as battleground states.
This is all perfectly doable without changing the Constitution.
Thoughts?
-PJ
I was a member of the JBS from 1977 to 1981 and I have no use for it.
Any "original interpretation" that would exclude their interpretation of the Constitution is probably not very "originalist."
The first advantage would be local control. A congressman would have daily access to his 30,000 constituents and would hear them clearly without the current massive filtering via his staff.
The second advantage would be the disappearance of K Street. The locus of corruption would move from the District of Columbia to the 10,000 or so congressional districts. That many congressmen is far too many to bribe or pay off efficiently. It would reduce the influence of big money on the electoral process.
The third advantage would be national security. A nuclear device detonated over Washington would have no effect on the House, which would continue to do business on one or more secure servers while the remainder of the government recovered from the attempted decapitation.
This would be a good way of entering the 21st Century in terms of technology.
Interesting idea about a virtual House. The 30,000 per Representative was a minimum. At that number, you would have over 10,000 Representatives. Even if the ratio were 100,000:1, that would be just under 3,100 Representatives.
You would still have a physical Senate? I suggested a few essays ago that the Senate should be thought of as more of a gathering of state ambassadors to a United States (without the Security Council of controlling states). Let them gather and agree on mutually beneficial interests.
It would be an interesting new dynamic to have a virtual House and a physical Senate.
-PJ
This is it exactly.
The conspiracy theory the Society promotes is a theory held, aside from the JBS, by explicitly anti-Semitic people/organizations. This may sound on the surface like the Birchers are nice folks because they're the only conspiracists who aren't officially and openly anti-Semitic. But what it really means is that anyone who joins them enters a world made up almost entirely of anti-Semites. Every organization, every publication will encounter from that point onward will be explicitly anti-Semitic (the JBS alone excepted). Often the member draws the obvious conclusion and simply joins the anti-Semites. This is why I often call the JBS the "blue lodge" of the anti-Semitic movement in the United States.
The Birch Society has also promoted and praised anti-Semites as "anti-conspiracy" heroes (Henry Ford, Charles Lindbergh) and published works by other anti-Semites (Nesta Webster, Prince Michel Sturdza). Is it any wonder that so many Birchers wind up as full-throttle Jew-haters? (And yes, I know they have Jewish members.)
Even Willis Carto and Ben Klassen (a fanatical atheist whose blasphemous writings may be found online) started out as John Birchers. Revilo P. Oliver was one of the eleven men present at the meeting where Robert H.W. Welch Jr. founded the John Birch Society.
Nowadays the formerly military-supporting JBS has turned into raging pacifists who refer to traditonalist Americans as "red state fascists." Apparently after the fall of Communism they regard all American military action as benefiting Jews and Israel.
These are not nice people. Stay as far away from them as possible. Believe me . . . I used to think they were wonderful! Were it not for my fanatical pro-Jewish religious beliefs they might have turned me into an anti-Semite too (G-d forbid!). But instead when I saw what they were I got out.
Also, "interdiction" calls to mind young Federalist Daniel Webster and his opposition to a military draft in the War of 1812. Daniel Webster is a much more preferable role model than John C. Calhoun.
You have the kernel. I hope you develop it in a stand alone vanity.
After repeal of the 17A, a virtual senate that features senators with offices adjacent to state legislative chambers is worth considering.
Still, legislatures are personal in nature, so I’m not sold on a entirely virtual congress, but certainly look forward to your ideas.
James Madison used the term “interposition” in the Virginia Resolution opposing the Alien and Sedition Acts.
A virtual Senate with senators' offices in the state legislatures would make sense. The repeal of the 17th Amendment could also end the six-year term of senators and make them "at will" employees of their respective legislatures. If there is a party change in the state legislature, the new legislature would be able to change their senators as befits a change of state policy toward the federal entity.
A total virtual Congress would solve a lot of problems of a very large country.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.