Posted on 11/16/2016 1:05:03 PM PST by bobk3
House Members are elected by the majority vote of their congressional District.
I wonder what would happen if we amended or cancelled out the 17th amendment, with language that stipulated that since House Members represent 700,000 people, shouldn’t Senate members be elected in like manner.
Each Congressional District would have one vote in the election of a Senator. This vote would be determined by the number of Congressional Districts that voted in majority for the Senate candidate, rather than the statewide “winner take all” voting process we currently have.
Large urban areas would only have one or two State level votes, ranter than swamping out the remaining Congressional Districts’ votes, and disenfranchising the voters in the other district through voter fraud. After all aren’t we a Representative Republic?
Hell hath no fury like a congressman threatened by term limits. lol
Most of America stands behind Trump.
**********
True, but most of congress does not.
We have term limits. They are called elections. And in states like mine, where there are term limits, everything is just as corrupt and backwards as those without.
Trump needs massive support on this.. basically to enact this, you are going to need people to voluntarily vote themselves out of jobs and power....
The people have to be solidly behind this for it to have any chance... and my personal take is, only shot at all it has is if Trump aims to take out folks who don’t back this in the midterm and campaigns hard for them, and wins big. Then maybe enough fear will be put into those who are left that they aren’t going to have a future in politics anyway if they stand against it.
Two terms for Senators, 5 for Members of Congress should be plenty. If anyone can make that deal happen it will be Trump.
At such a convention, anything could happen. They could well decide to expand their discussions to, for example, the second amendment. Who's to say they can't? Something to consider at least.
They will resist because it’s their nature - the NYT is only mentioning it because they think they’re some of the “I have concerns about Trump” FReepers that keep chipping away at his support.
The post 17th Amendment Senate is more in need of term limits than The House.
Yeah, might as well require every politician have two unicorns with him at all times- and a bag of skittles.
The Founders were right again, I'm amazed how that amazes people.
I would much rather go back to Senators being appointed by each state legislature.
Term limits are a BAD IDEA. I like Trump, but this is NOT good.
For all its problems, Congress is still the only, and most directly representative of the will of the people.
Limiting Congressional terms will just give more power to faceless apparatchiks and legal experts behind the scenes, as well as more power to the massive Fed.gov nanny state. How about we limit the MASSIVE Federal Bureaucracy instead?? Their extra-legal rule-making ability is the cause of the increase in the size of the Federal Register, and hence all the lobbying and corruption around it.
If you want to limit stuff to “drain the swamp.”
- limit lobbying by former federal officials of their previous agencies
- limit all Federal agencies and offices to 10 year sunset limit. They automatically go away in 10 years unless renewed by Congress
- Enforce the debt-limit (debt ceiling)
The 17th Amendment didn’t change the the number of senators. It changed the way they were elected by the individual state legislators to a popular vote by the state’s voters. This gave senators access to lots of out of state dollars and basically made them unaccountable to their state legislature.
If we simply repeal the 17th Amendment and go back to the system we had before, we’d have the same number of Senators, but what it would do is give state governments a lot more influence within the federal government, as the founders intended. As it is now, the states have no way to directly influence the federal government.
Of course, direct election of Senators like we have currently is more democratic than having state legislatures appoint them like we used to, but at the same time it took away one of the main ways state governments could try to protect themselves and promote their own interests within the federal government (a key part of the checks and balances the founders envisioned). There are good arguments to be made for both sides, but in many ways it’s a question of where we want power to be concentrated—in D.C. or in state capitals?
Its a bi, uglyg swamp out there, Mr Trump.
“Lots and lots of uniformed people live in this country.”
- Yes, Tax-chick, they do AND also in many foreign
countries as well. Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, National
Guard, Police Officers, Postmen, UPS delivery people and
others, nurses, doctors sort of, military school kids,
McDonald’s workers, etc.
You really believe that these Congressmen and Senators who have been part of the Washington power structure for decades like John McCain are more connected and accountable to the people they represent than someone who’s only been there a few years? You really feel that politicians need to be in power for a very long period of time in order to have any real power? If they’ve only been in Congress for a few years, then they have little power and that all their normal powers will be in the hands of bureaucrats instead? Forgive me, if I find that reasoning very sketchy. Our elected officials have the same amount of legal power and authority vis-a-vis the bureaucracy whether they’ve been in office 3 years or 30.
The people in power in Washington have set things up so that it is extremely difficult to vote out an incumbent. They have made it so that most of them, contrary to what the founders wrote that they wanted, can spend their whole lives as legislators, even while paying scant attention to their constituents.
I think term limits is the one and only way we stand a chance of breaking up the Good Old Boy (and Girl) power structure in Congress. That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t clean up and cut back on the bureaucracy too, as Trump has also vowed to do. The time for game playing has passed; we need to really take on the D.C. establishment while we have a chance of changing things.
If Arizonans don't like McCain, they can vote him out. At least he comes up for re-election every 6 years. You can't vote for the head of the FDA or the NLRB.
Our elected officials have the same amount of legal power and authority vis-a-vis the bureaucracy whether they’ve been in office 3 years or 30.
You need to meet some Congressional staffers and spend time in DC. These people bounce around among Congressmen. If their boss is voted out, they can easily find jobs with incoming Congressmen. Smart ones are well-connected to their parties, who want to keep them around. WHY? Because they know the system, they know the rules, they know how our massive Federal Government works and that never changes because its supported by massive government debt. They do all the leg-work for the Congressmen. They become high-powered lobbyists. If you rotate in newbie Congressmen every six years, then these people become the power behind the curtain (more than they already are).
How about just following the CONSTITUTION? Do away with unconstitutional government activities, not our elected representatives. Limit the massive size and power of federal bureaucracies - give them term-limits instead. The corruption you speak off feeds off their huge rule-writing ability.
Term limits are a dream come true for the nanny-state and the social-engineering left - and you want to hand them this gift on a silver plate.
To find out more click on Convention of States at the top of the FR forum page. There are a series of great informative posts on Article V of the Constitution. This is something we really need in order to return to the Constitutional Republic that our founders intended. There are other FReepers who explain this better than I. Keep asking questions until you understand. It is a very important tenet to our liberty.
Psst.. Hey, Congress, guess what.. Trump’s beaten you in the primaries, and for quite a number of you, in the general as well. If he uses his inauguration to really push term limits, and you balk at it, contemplate how much fun you’ll have.
Myself, I disagree with term limits. It has worked out awful in California, effectively pushing out anyone willing to stand up against the onslaught and replacing them with milk toast who are rotating from other term limited public service. Plus, hey, we get to pay for them for the rest of our lives as they get ‘retirement’ benefits.
But those who wish to stand against the new president - you do so at your own peril. You want to argue against the point, do so. But a wholesale declining will result in a fight that you’ll lose.
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