Posted on 07/07/2013 5:42:17 PM PDT by neverdem
Americans may be able to regain control over their federal government by moving their respective individual state legislatures to invalidate the 16th and 17th Amendments to the United States Constitution. Essentially, this is a vote to reverse ratification of an Amendment without a Constitutional Convention.
Repeal of the 16th Amendment starves the federal beast by depriving it of its consumption of money from the states and the taxpayers through income. States could exercise better control over how or even if their money is spent.
Repeal of the 17th Amendment makes United States senators directly appointed by the state legislatures, as they were at our nation's founding, and representative of the will of each state and its citizens. This action would check the federal government's proclivity to pass laws binding the states to unfunded mandates. It would increase the sovereignty of the several states and restore true federalism back into our system of government.
The states can do this by individual vote; this way, a Constitutional Convention and the subsequent dangers presents to liberty can be avoided. Three-fourths of the state legislatures would have to vote to repeal each or any Amendment. Once each state votes to invalidate an Amendment, the vote is sent to the Archivist of the National Archives. The result would be a return to the Constitution as it existed before the now repealed Amendments were included.
The United States of America was founded as a representative republic, where several sovereign states voluntarily joined under a common federal sovereign to better guarantee the unalienable rights of "We the People." This federal government was to be strictly limited to the enumerated powers given to it under the Constitution of the United States by the sovereignty of the several states and the people, who themselves are sovereign individuals...
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
Maybe you came across this. How did they deal with split legislatures prior to the 17th?
ping a ling a ling
As much trouble as the original senate selection process was, what we have now is infinitely worse.
Levin Liberty Project?
What’s the difference? Article after article and Amendment after Amendment of the US Constitution is being used as toilet paper by Obama and the statists now anyway that it doesn’t matter.
At this point I think we’d be better off even if split legislatures were to pick one from both parties.
However, selling the idea of taking people’s vote for senator away is an incredibly high hurdle. Last summer Pete Hoekstra made the comment that he would like to get rid of the 17th amendment and the democrats went rabid screeching about him wanting to TAKE YOUR VOTE AWAY!!!!
You might be able to convince people to vote for senators by congressional district and the one who takes the most districts wins. You might actually be able to sell that if you can show how it puts control back into the hands of the individual states.
There is no provision in the Constitution to de-ratify an amendment. A vote for ratification is a vote for ratification. No do-overs.
Is this proposal legal?
We all know that the 18the amendment, Prohibition, was repealed by passing the 21st amendment. But the states didn’t just nullify their ratification of the 18the amendment. Congress ratified the 21st amendment, then sent it to be ratified by the States.
So I’m wondering if repeal amendments would have to be approved by Congress before the states could get to vote on these issues?
But an Amendment CAN repeal a prior Amendment, viz. the 21st Amendment:
Section 1. The eighteenth article of amendment to the Constitution of the United States is hereby repealed.
Thanks for the comment, but rats aren't that stupid. They're too concentrated in big cities.
O.E.0 has a burr about ‘nullification’. Yes, it’s possible as the 21st showed.
That's the only way an amendment can be un-done.
the scotus has been compromised and decisions like nullification should be wrested from them it is we the people who must determine our fate not a coven of black robed witches
Repeal Obamacare.
Remove Holder.
Special Prosecutors for Gunwalker, Eavesdropping programs, and Benghazi.
Thanks neverdem.
the 16th Amendment
Constitution of the United States, via FindLaw et al | ratified on February 3, 1913 | The Framers et al
Posted on 06/05/2009 10:59:47 AM PDT by SunkenCiv
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/chat/2265664/posts
the 17th Amendment
Constitution of the United States, via FindLaw et al | ratified by the states April 8, 1913 | The Framers et al
Posted on 06/11/2009 5:33:16 PM PDT by SunkenCiv
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/chat/2270026/posts
When Amnesty is passed, it's over.
It’s true that once a right is given to a voter, it is near impossible to take it back. The right to vote is a positive right. The right for the federal government to define ‘income’ however they wish and take it from the citizenry is a negative right.
However, we can amend the Constitution to allow state legislatures to recall their wayward US Senators thereby holding them to account to state interests. And I doubt recalls would occur often because just the threat of a recall should be enough for a Senator to get the message.
Between a risk of being primaried by voters or recalled by state legislatures, US Senators should be expected to act more responsibly to their states and constituencies.
What if a state decided to nullify the Supreme Court's D.C. v. Heller decision?
I’m up for anything that puts senators back under the control of the states. However that still leaves me with Detroit, Ann Arbor, and Flint choosing my senators despite the GOP 3 branch majority here.
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