How the Founders' original design would affect the US Senate

American Thinker ^ | August 28, 2022 | J.H. Capron

[ScaniaBoy]

There have been many details exposed over the last two years about how our government at all levels is not what we thought it was, and none of what we're hearing bodes well for this republic.

Let's focus on one issue: the U.S. Senate. It's clearer than it has ever been that it's just a collection of elected officials, behaving as if they're independent actors with no restraint. It's as if they have no allegiance to anyone. The citizens of their respective states matter not, except once every six years, when they play the "how can I fool them again" game. They're a law unto themselves. Oh, and the welfare of their respective states? They couldn't care less.

How did this come about? The 17th Amendment.

Nineteen thirteen was a terrible year for our republic. It delivered a double–constitutional body blow: first, imposing a federal income tax — the 16th Amendment — and then the general election of U.S. senators — the 17th Amendment.

Prior to the 17th Amendment, state legislatures appointed senators. Each state had its own process for this. The senators were the gating mechanism against a House of Representatives that had a penchant toward foolishness. Given the fruitcakes we see there today, it's clear the Founding Fathers knew what they were doing.

[ScaniaBoy]

Pretty amazing, if the Senate had been filled according to the original rules it would have looked like this:

63 Republicans 37 Democrats

[fedupjohn]

And the Senators answered to the Governor.

[who_would_fardels_bear]

If the 17th Amendment hadn't been passed, then I'm sure the Dems would have worked harder to win more governorships and state legislatures to guarantee that more Dems went into the Senate.

Every state now has large metropolitan areas that vote predominantly Dem with ever-shrinking rural areas. Now even the suburbs are turning squishy.

We can't just assume a static model that if there were no 17th Amendment that all of the politicos and voters would have behaved the same.

[SuperLuminal]

Excellent article from a usually crappy website...

[ScaniaBoy]

You are quite right, one can never assume that things would develop the same way but for one thing. Still, looking at the US map of legislative districts it is very red. If the Democrats wanted to make it bluer, they would not have allowed their party to be taken over by the far left.

So, a non-passed 17th Amendment could have worked both ways.

[Southside_Chicago_Republican]

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[qaz123]

There are only 11, Blue Across the Board states, if I’m not mistaken.

Over 20, RED Across the Board, although some of them, with regards to their Governor’s, aren’t so RED. Arkansas, Utah. But the legislatures in are pretty solid.

Then the rest. The Purple ones. And Kentucky and Louisiana are sending Republican’s, probably NC, too. I doubt any of them are throwing a bone to their Governors.

So, we’d be looking at a solid 60+ in the Senate. And, the RNC and state GOP apparatus wouldn’t have as much clout in the process, which would be nice.

Every state now has large metropolitan areas that vote predominantly Dem with ever-shrinking rural areas. Now even the suburbs are turning squishy....I imagine you’re referring to the Southern and Midwestern states shifting, as the Liberals that have destroyed everything up North, are now migrating elsewhere. And the southern and midwestern Governor’s cannot seem to say, NO.

[jjotto]

By the passing of the 17th, only a very few states did not have some sort of popular referendum on selecting senators. Recall the famous Lincoln-Douglas Debates, which were an appeal to the general voting public rather than to state legislators, who were expected to abide by the people’s choice.

[nwrep]

Yes but the founders thought the states would become and remain the most powerful entities in the Union. They did not envision political parties controlling states, so that some states subordinate their own self-interests to the national interests of the political party they serve (e.g. blue states). This was completely unanticipated by the founders.

[rarestia]

Yet I post something yesterday saying we should abolish the 17th amendment, and suddenly I’m an idiot?

Repeal the 17th & the 16th, ratify article the first, and let’s get back to basics.

[Regulator]

1913 was even worse.

It also featured the chartering of the Federal Reserve Bank, which needed the income tax to collateralize the worthless paper it planned to issue.

This turned the populace into serfs whose futures were mortgaged, returning us to feudalism.

The Senate had to be gutted to prevent the sovereign States from reversing this.

[fieldmarshaldj]

The Senators were supposed to abide by the wishes of the state legislatures. However, once Senators discovered they were under no LEGAL obligations (only a gentleman’s agreement) to do so, they acted largely as they pleased. This was why it was a failure from the beginning. Had their been an instrument in the Constitution allowing for a simple recall of a Senator by the legislature (for failure to follow instructions on how to vote), it would’ve fulfilled more of the Founding Fathers’ vision for that body.

[fieldmarshaldj]

That wouldn’t fix our problems. The legislatures would merely send 100 Senators with one singular goal in mind: loot the U.S. Treasury and send as much money back to the states as you can get. If by chance they sent a Conservative to the Senate (they wouldn’t except by accident, as the Republicans would all be fiscal spendthrift RINOs), they’d be promptly removed for not sending the big $$ to their given state.

[ScaniaBoy]

Thanks for that historical information. A Constitution or a State does not usually fall with one fell sweep, but often during a longer period of slow change (eg Rome of antiquity).

Recall the famous Lincoln-Douglas Debates, which were an appeal to the general voting public rather than to state legislators...

But Douglas won, even though Lincoln was elected to the Presidency a couple of years later.

[Lurkinanloomin]

Does it even matter when we can’t even get them to uphold the natural born citizen clause?

The purpose was to keep foreigners out of the office.

Obama was born with foreign nationality.
So was Harris.

[Olog-hai]

If the Democrats could have worked in that fashion, then they would have preferred it over passing something like the 17^th Amendment; thing is, the House would have been able to counter that. But their goal was to replace the republic with what a pundit recently termed a “radical democracy”, so the amendment was necessary to them in order to wrest state power in DC (the purpose of the Senate) completely out of the states’ hands in favor of centralizing it in the federal government.

In (the United States of) America, where a democratic constitution has already been established, the communists must make the common cause with the party that will turn this constitution against the bourgeoisie and use it in the interests of the proletariat …

— The Principles of Communism

[ScaniaBoy]

And if the Senate were never given the Power of the Purse?

[V K Lee]

Their allegiance was to their STATE rather than their personal
ambitions and agenda.

[Hootowl99]

Your right, In that pre-17th Amendment Senators could answer to the state governor. But, it was up to the legislature to decide how their Senator was selected.

Some examples that were used originally:/p>

Selected by the governor for a 6-year term
Proposed by the Governor with appointment subject to legislature approval for a 6-year term
Direct election by the people for a 6-year term (this is mandated now via the 17th Amendment)

What I like best is to have the governor send 1 or 2 candidates to the state Senate for selection by vote. This puts two branches of the state government on the hook for selecting a senator and toss the governor and legislature bums out if they screw up.

[bigbob]

My analogy for the Senate is a convention of high school principals. Sure, they’d take pride in their schools football record and other accomplishments of “the little people” whose welfare they were hired to oversee, but in reality they spend all their time talking high school principal stuff to the other high school principals. After all, they are on an elevated plane, and have big thoughts to think, and big ideas to implement - they’re much more interested in forming relationships with the other principals and getting goodies for themselves through favors and insider deals. In the end they go back to their schools and strut around to show their importance and maybe mumble a few words about how great the school and its students are.

But the thing that really matters, just as in the senate, is THEMSELVES. THEIR career, THEIR perks and bennies, THEIR power. After all they were put in this position because they were better than everyone else who was considered for it, right?