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Cutting Off Congress and Saving Our Country
Watching the floundering and fecklessness of our Congress, observing their throwing fiscal responsibility to the wind, and realizing that the most important agenda they have is to be re-elected, I wanted to help find a way to help transform Congress and its effects on this country. And I think I’ve found a way.
For months, I have been struggling with a decision. It’s about getting involved with an organization, and I am not a joiner. Nor do I like to make commitments that I might not be able to keep. I also want there to be a likelihood of the organization’s success.
I’ve written a bit before about the Convention of States. Initially I was skeptical about their goals, and their chances of success. But the more I read about them, the more impressed I was with not only their plans, but also with their anticipation of roadblocks and ways to overcome them.
If you haven’t heard of them, the organization was formed based on Article V of the Constitution:
Article V of the U.S. Constitution gives states the power to call a convention to propose amendments. It takes 34 states to call the convention and 38 to ratify any amendments that are proposed. Our convention would only allow the states to discuss amendments that, ‘limit the power and jurisdiction of the federal government, impose fiscal restraints, and place term limits on federal officials.’
I was especially impressed with their strategies for keeping the COS from going off the rails. They’ve designed an orderly and practical process for initiating, conducting and completing the process.
But in spite of my initial enthusiasm, I began to have questions that weren’t being answered by the FAQ’s of the organization. So instead of continuing to dither around, I decided to ask about the questions I was struggling with.
One of my biggest concerns was that Congress would simply ignore or table the application completed for a COS. I learned that Article V has already been addressed in the courts, including United States v. Sprague, 282 U.S. 716 (1931), so if Congress tries to sabotage or ignore the process, it will be sued.
When I asked how a lawsuit would be pursued, I was told the following by COS staff:
This is settled law and that quote came from Michael Farris who is one of our co-founders and a constitutional attorney who practices before the Supreme Court. In fact, he is the only living attorney who has argued Article V case law before the court and is an authority in such matters. Generally, a state attorney general would file suit and the other 33 states would then join the suit, but that is highly unlikely that Congress would act in such a way because too many members know this and are endorsers of our project. The current Speaker of the House is a supporter and was in the LA state legislature when we passed our application there.
To date, 19 states have approved the Convention of States, and at the beginning of 2024, at least 11 more states have presented the resolution to their state legislatures.
* * * *
So, I’ve made my decision, in spite of my reservations about group-joining, and I officially joined. I crossed over the finish line when I saw the jobs they offer volunteers—they needed writers! I felt I was a good fit for the kinds of writers they needed.
I hope they agree.
Published in Politics
I wonder if the Progressives of that time period , the first years of the 2oth Century, captured the issues where they could see benefit and with information dissemination much less broadly available then with little radio and print and no television or internet easily got all the changes they wanted.
16th and 17th Amendments and creation of the Federal Reserve Central Bank prominent among them.
Not the same today.
Some amendments were sold with lies..
Yes, with no delivery of opposing views like we have.
Could someone explain why eliminating the 17th amendment would be essential? I assume there’s some fundamental reason. I looked at this description of the pros and cons and it didn’t help me clarify the issues.
It fundamentally altered the relationship between the States and the Federal government. The Senate was intended to represent the States as States, not the people of the States. That’s why Senators were originally appointed by the state legislatures.
(Yes, I’m ignoring the compromise that led to the Senate.)
Voter fraud would be much less effective without votes that count statewide. State Governor would be the only office where votes could be fabricated in large urban areas and affect the statewide outcome provided the EC Electors were removed from popular vote..
It’s far from the only thing that altered that relationship. Wars did a lot more to alter that relationship, aided and abetted by improvements in transportation and communication technology.
I agree, but it’s a fundamental, Constitutional/structural change that was not really needed, except to make the Senate a bastardized House O’ Representin’.
I’ve gone back and forth in my mind on how fundamental that was, ever since I started thinking about it when I was a teenager in the 60s. But if we can get people thinking about everything in terms of federal relations, that will be a good start in itself.
you need to explains what this is.
True!
How often do we complain that senators are more aligned with the whims of the national party than the state? Do you think Democrat senators would vote lockstep as they do now? Who would they fear most, party leadership and its big donors or their state legislative body? Would a McConnell or Schumer have as much control over their party senators?
Ditch stupidpedia – bookmark Heritage Guide to the Constitution.
https://www.heritage.org/constitution/#!/amendments/17/essays/178/popular-election-of-senators
I highlighted what I thought was an important point in the first paragraph. But maybe I’m being really thick today–how do the points in the second paragraph matter. Is there an advantage to having been born in a state? Are we supposed to disdain an Ivy League education. And what about the “higher level of prior governmental service?” Maybe something has been lost in the cut and paste.
BTW, I have been officially welcomed into COS! I received a friendly phone call this morning and an email listing the next steps for me to take. And I will be a content writer! They include four videos (45min./each) as a kind of orientation, including one on listening to and addressing objections. I’m excited!
Yes, because the government forcing things on people without assuming any responsibility or risk on themselves is ALWAYS wrong, whether is is forcing shutdowns or forcing vaccines. You cannot force people to assume risk and leave them to deal with the consequences.
If I was to guess, I think the answer is that popular election usually attracts and gets retail politicians. The Legislature was free to appoint someone who was the equivalent of what today would be called a lobbyist — protecting the state’s interest in DC. That person need not be resident in the state or have long standing connections, the way a retail politician would. I think the Ivy league reference reflects the network of connections to both money and power that would propel a retail politician in a career. To extend the lobbyist angle, the state Legislature could likely induce a resignation and replacement, whereas popularly elected retail politicians have an independent base and a national party that can keep them in office.
The US Constitution had never been done before either.
Hmm, maybe it should be easier to undo an amendment than to pass one in the first place?
Never mind, too many ways for that to backfire.
Relationships between the national and the state governments. The United States started out as a confederation of states and later under the Constitution became more unified than a mere confederation, but the “federal” part of the term continues to be used.
Definition of confederation: “an organization which consists of a number of parties or groups united in an alliance or league. “a confederation of trade unions”” Here are examples from the Merriam-Webster online dictionary of how “federate” is used in a sentence.
Sometimes there is confusion because people call the national government the federal government. But that usage got started with the PR campaign to get the Constitution ratified. The supporters of the Constitution called themselves federalists, and the opponents got stuck with the term “anti-federalists,” though they could just have legitimately called themselves the federalists. Being “anti-” anything doesn’t usually have a positive, progressive-sounding connotation.
No argument pro or con in the second paragraph. Just an interesting tidbit. I gave the link to the essay.
Fewer Senators would mindlessly vote for unfunded mandates.
Very good point. They’d have to answer to the staters if they did.
As does the 16th, which along with the 17th vitiated the federalist system set up by the founders, allowed the federal tail to wag the federalist dog, and set the stage for leviathan under which the nation suffers today. If the permanent repeal of these two amendments are not on the agenda, there is no reason for a COS—indeed it would do more harm than good. And I see no sign that anyone is contemplating such a thing.
Could you explain your thinking on this?
Public health is an actual public good. It has to be done with government force and central planning. The problem is all of those guys were dishonest, stupid, liars. Never in a million years did I see this coming.
The vaccine didn’t stop the spread. They almost completely lied about it until August 1. They changed the definition of vaccine twice. Centralized power is worthless.
The economy naturally produces deflation. The Fed needs to stop running with inflation.
If you throw a bunch of money under your mattress, why should the government be able to steal from it? Why shouldn’t you be able to get one percent over the supposed inflation rate in a savings account?
We should have quit all of this the second the Soviet Union fell.
Georgia lost control of 400,000 mail in ballots. The ballot controls were terrible. Breitbart news got the Georgia Secretary of State to admit it. We love Third World ballot control. It’s everywhere.
Everything you need to know is right here:
http://financialrepressionauthority.com/2017/07/26/the-roundtable-insight-george-bragues-on-how-the-financial-markets-are-influenced-by-politics/
https://mises.org/wire/were-living-age-capital-consumption
Yeah. Repeal of these would do far more than term limits for congress and senate. Congress is where policy stability comes from and it needs to be reinforced, no weakened further. HoR has enough turn over and repeal of the 17th will resolve the Walking Dead senators.
Repeal of the 16th is how the government justifies abrogating to itself all of the services it has accumulated. If the federal is not paying for itself with income tax dollars, there is no education department, CDC, FBI… not even a centralized military complex*** (which isn’t even constitutional). The money returns to the states where THEY provide the necessities to their own citizens. Where it belongs.
There might be efficiency in centralization, but that also makes corruption of everything far more likely. And since we are at corruption of everything, I’m far less interested in efficiency of scale than I am in subsidiarity.
*** The Trump impeachment and the classified document case and the Biden administration have solidified in my mind that the location of power in our government does not reside in our elected branches, but in our military/IC complex. There was a military coup. But I don’t know when it was and I don’t think our elected branches cared. It just became more obvious under Trump.