Did Michigan Just Trigger 'Constitutional Convention'? Bid Gains Steam

Fox News ^ | 4/2/14 | Barnini Chakraborty

[MeganC]

All a Convention can do is PROPOSE changes - they do NOT have a plenopotentiary power to draft and adopt a new Constitution.

I really wish you fear mongers would cut it out with the propaganda because this is the one chance we will have in my lifetime to restore this country to a constitutional republic!

Right now we have a socialist dictator in the Oval Office whose claimed powers are unchecked by Congress or the Supreme Court and this is the Constitutuionally-designed method for WE THE PEOPLE to resolve this problem!

[Secret Agent Man]

the conventions are not open ended or mean the constitution is suspended or can be rewritten from the ground up. they are called for specific, well-known, narrow questions to be dealt with.

[Publius]

What Madison wrote matters, even today.

I'm horrified at the sheer misinformation of your posts on this thread. I would think that the co-author of A Patriot's History would know what he is talking about. But it appears you haven't looked into Article V, parsed its words, or looked at the history of Supreme Court decisions laying out case law on the topic.

As a serious historian, you need to do some research, with or without Mike Allen, and look at what is involved. An Amendments Convention is not the out-of-control runaway convention you fear. It is simply the means by which the states may bypass Congress to propose amendments. As far as ratification is concerned, we have law and precedent to go by. There is no room for creative interpretation here.

[cripplecreek]

The 17th is definitely one of the worst but I don’t trust the state legislatures to pick good senators either.

Personally I’d like to see them elected on some sort of electoral style system rather than statewide pop vote but give the legislature the power to recall them.

[central_va]

A rebellion by TX and, say, ND would be crushed in a heartbeat.

The current standing army of 400,000(and shrinking) couldn't crush tiny Delaware and occupy it.

[central_va]

So is your treatise on how great the 17th amendment has been to the republic ready? LOL

[cripplecreek]

You need to take your sick little obsession with me and shove it up your idiot ass right next to your head.

I made no comment to you yet you follow me from thread to thread with your harassment. You need help.

[central_va]

I am glad I am getting under your skin, it is my goal because you continue grinding your status quo axe on these Article V and Con Con threads. You have an agenda and I will try to thwart you at every opportunity. GET USED TO IT.

[cripplecreek]

And now the harassment continues in my FReepmail as well.

[central_va]

So what, go away or start a pro 17th amendment thread. Progressives like you would flock to it.

[Jacquerie]

<> NO ONE can control it and it comes down to might makes right. <>

The states will not send schlubs off the street, nor even representatives to the convention. They will send delegates. These agents of the states will have commissions that delineate exactly what they are authorized to do.

Here is the summary of Florida's bill.

Article V Constitutional Convention: Establishes qualifications of delegates & alternate delegates to Article V constitutional convention; provides for appointment of delegates by Legislature; authorizes Legislature to recall delegate & fill vacancy; authorizes presiding officers to call special legislative session to carry out certain provisions relating to appointments; requires delegates to sign oath; provides for instructions to delegates; establishes circumstances under which convention vote is declared void; provides circumstances under which delegate's appointment is forfeited; establishes circumstances under which application to call Article V convention ceases to be continuing application & is deemed to have no effect; provides penalties; establishes delegate advisory group.

Effective Date: July 1, 2014

Last Event: CS passed; YEAS 73, NAYS 42 on Friday, April 11, 2014 12:52 PM

[Admin Moderator]

Cool it guys. You’re involved in a stupid flamewar and we do not want to deal with it.

If you don’t knock it off we may be forced to give each of you some time off.

Thanks,
AM

[mazda77]

So we just throw up our hands and bend over without the Vaseline? So since you are part of the solution, how about cluing the rest of us in on it/sarc.

[c-b 1]

This is a Convention of the States. It will have no effect on the Articles or the Bill of Rights which were ratified as a package.

Could You please provide documentation that proves that. Please don't come back with information from the Convention of States People, I've spent hours studying their information, there is no proof there.

[MeganC]

Read Article V of the United States Constitution. THAT is my documentation!

[RipSawyer]

You have a vivid imagination, I said nothing of the sort.

[nomad]

The only thing that ever should be discussed in this manner is the dissolution of the union and which states are going to form how many separate and independent North American nations./p>

[c-b 1]

I think you need to study article V, there is no proof there of anything you say.

Conventions is not mentioned in the part describing the ammendment process, it is only mentioned in the ratification process. There is nothing in Article V that would prevent rewriting the entire Constitution. You are simply repeating Rob Nattleson's opinion.

Article V

The Congress, whenever two thirds of both houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose amendments to this Constitution, or, on the application of the legislatures of two thirds of the several states, shall call a convention for proposing amendments, which, in either case, shall be valid to all intents and purposes, as part of this Constitution, when ratified by the legislatures of three fourths of the several states, or by conventions in three fourths thereof, as the one or the other mode of ratification may be proposed by the Congress; provided that no amendment which may be made prior to the year one thousand eight hundred and eight shall in any manner affect the first and fourth clauses in the ninth section of the first article; and that no state, without its consent, shall be deprived of its equal suffrage in the Senate.

[C210N]

Conventions is not mentioned in the part describing the ammendment process, it is only mentioned in the ratification process...

You don't consider "a convention for proposing amendments" to be in the first part, for the amendment proposals?

Where Art V refers to the Constitution, in two places it specifically refers to "this" Constitution. My interpretation of that is that a COS cannot and does not and will not start with a clean slate EVER.

The ONLY way to get a clean slate for a Constitution (note 'a', not 'this') is after a civil war. Proposing amendments, either via Congress or by COS, is only to the current Constitution as adopted. Granted, an amendment *could* wipe out another amendment... as I'd like to see with the 17th, but that still requires its own ratification.

[Publius]

Not exactly. There are in fact two ways to write a new constitution.

The first is to amend Article V to allow such a thing. Once that happens, either Congress or a Convention -- remember that both bodies have the exact same proposal powers -- can write a new constitution.

The second is different. According to "Blackstone's Commentaries on the Law", the bible of English Common Law, if there is a revolution followed by a "state of nature", i.e., anarchy, then the political society that arises from those two conditions can write a new constitution.

So there are two ways it could happen. But within the current language of Article V, you are correct. It can't be done.