Toward a Standing Article V Convention

In our last guest essay for Coach is Right we made an opening case for Article V state amendment conventions, rather than SCOTUS, to deal with major social and governing issues. It is through state conventions rather than the elastic whims of nine unaccountable lawyers that the Framers envisioned a free people would keep and improve their republic.

Enlightenment philosophers recognized that whereas power is aggressive, liberty is passive. Unless it is actively pursued, liberty will always fade in the face of encroaching power. Our Framing generation knew this and provided the means by which liberty could be actively defended.

It is precisely because we have neglected to keep and improve our republic since passage of the despicable 16th and 17th Amendments that an emerging class of Washington DC elites took the opportunity to run wild and feed their avarice and ambition, man’s natural hunger for power and wealth, all at the expense of liberty.

An unfortunate reality is that America has come to accept as final the often fanciful mutterings of the Supreme Court. With its Roe, Lawrence and Obergefell decisions, SCOTUS not only supplanted the supreme law of the land, it trashed God’s Law. Its June 2015 decisions blew the lid off what remained of limited and free government; without saying, it formalized the Progressives dream of a living and breathing constitution.

But be of good cheer, for there is an out. These and many other decades’ old outrages and assaults on free government and society do not have to stand.

It is through the Article V state convention amendment process that We the People can exert our sovereign authority to not only repeal the 16th and 17th Amendments...

I have never understood the Conservative obsession with the 17th Amendment - direct election of Senators.

I would enjoy seeing some well informed speculation from Free Republic commenters about which current or historical politicians would - or would not - have become Senators under the current election rules, or, by vote of a state Legislature.

For instance - Lincoln lost the 1858 Senate election by vote of the Illinois state Legislature. It is quite possible Lincoln would have won a popular election in Illinois.

For instance - I think Ted Cruz would have had a very difficult time being elected by the Texas Legislature

Recall the Articles of Confederation pertained to, and acted only on the states. Therefore, delegates from the states attended congress.

All republican governments prior to ours acted strictly on on the people. Our constitution acts on two entities, the people and states. Common to all republics is for their members to be represented directly or indirectly in the law making body. Had the states been denied a body in congress, there is no way the constitution would have been ratified in 1788.

In order to remain consistent with republican theory, the states MUST have a seat at the legislative table if the government is to constitutionally act on them. To remain consistent with fundamental republicanism, every clause in the constitution which dealt with the states should have been repealed upon ratification of the 17th.

Now that of course can't be done because the states, people and the government they created are thoroughly intertwined in their duties and powers.

The 17th also introduced an element of tyranny into our system, because the national government was empowered to act on a component of the republic that doesn't have representation.

Removal of the states from congress makes as much sense as removing the people from congress. None.

The 17th introduced an internal contradiction that is largely responsible for the decline in our freedom. The 17th must go.

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