[nathanbedford]

Nathan Bedford's first Maxim of the American Constitution:

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.

[Star Traveler]

If the “old constitution” isn’t being followed, the “new constitution” won’t be followed either ... :-) ...

[usconservative]

Pretty powerful argument. Good post, I look forward to reading other well thought and considered posts on this thread.

Personally, I’m in the undecided camp. Yours is the best post FOR an Article V Convention I’ve read to date. I’ve also read several excellent posts against.

I think these types of discussions which used to happen all the time here, are the reason FR is on the forefront of online debate.

Thanks for your post.

[GraceG]

Excellent sumary!

I find it funny that people have no issue with the People on the swamp in potomac, ie, The House and Senate can ALREADY propose new amendments, but want to deny their LOCAL State Legislatures the EXACT SAME power.....

Article V is not some imaginary process, it is IN the DAMNED Constiution for crying out loud!

So we trust Harry Reid and the RINOs in the senate not to try to Propose some new Amendment by 2/3 vote more than the State Legislatures of all the Republican majority STATE LEGISLATURES????

I just cannot see why people are so scared shitless over a Article V Convention to PROPOSE Amendments.....

[DiogenesLamp]

And you must believe that whatever gets proposed will be an improvement over what we have now.

I, for one, shall not be surprised if they make "Gay Marriage" a constitutional amendment. Same thing with Abortion.

What will shock me beyond belief is that they do anything beneficial to the well being of the nation. The electorate of today are idiots.

[LS]

You don’t have to believe any of that. All you have to KNOW is that a ConCon would result in vastly more libs dominating it and it would rewrite the 1st and 2nd Amendments out in 30 seconds.

[RipSawyer]

You just mowed down a regiment of straw men. The point is that the vast majority of our problems could be solved by simply abiding by the constitution as it exists, even with its flaws, most of which are the result of previously passed amendments. There is no point in giving the same crowd a different constitution to ignore. They proudly support the constitution when it says or they can pretend it says what they want it to say. They studiously ignore anything which says something they don’t like. Without some way to change that fact there is simply zero point in proposing new amendments. It matters not what a doctor prescribes for a patient who will not take his medicine.