Sen. David Long's Bold Play for an Article V Convention

Townhall.com ^ | November 19. 2013 | Cal Thomas

[Kaslin]

Fed up with Washington? Angry that elections don't seem to matter when it comes time to solving problems? Disgusted by the polarization that puts politicians' careers ahead of taxpayer interests? Frustrated because you don't think anything can be done about it?

Indiana State Senator David Long (R-Ft. Wayne) has experienced all of these feelings, but has chosen not to accept the status quo. He has a plan for returning power to the people where the Founders wanted it to reside.

Long is promoting an unused section of the U.S. Constitution as the ultimate check on big government. Article V provides two paths to amending the Constitution. One is through two-thirds of both houses of Congress, followed by ratification by three-fourths of the states. The other begins at the state level, where two-thirds of the legislatures ask Congress to call "a convention for proposing amendments." States would send delegates to this convention to propose amendments to the Constitution. Then, three-fourths of the states would ratify any amendments approved by the convention, either by their legislatures or special ratifying conventions.

Long notes that the Founders wanted the states to be able to amend the Constitution as a means of checking a runaway federal government. They understood human nature and its lust for power.

In a telephone conversation, Sen. Long claims the biggest objection to an Article V convention is that those who participate might take the opportunity to engage in mischief and wreck the Constitution. But, he says, the ability of delegates to go beyond the limits set by their respective legislatures would be clearly restricted and delegates who attempt to exceed their authority would be removed.

The Indiana legislature has passed two measures that would, according to Long, "Require delegates to take an oath to uphold the state and U.S. Constitutions and abide by any instructions given to delegates by the General Assembly." It also establishes "Indiana's intention to send two delegates and two alternate delegates to an Article V convention."

Writing in Federalist No. 85, Alexander Hamilton expressed faith in the states to control out-of-control government: "We may safely rely on the disposition of the State legislatures to erect barriers against the encroachments of the national authority."

Long says he has commitments from representatives of at least 26 state legislatures to attend a Dec. 7 meeting at George Washington's home in Mt. Vernon, Va. The goal is "not to decide on any amendment to be considered, but to put together a structure on how a convention will be run." Once that structure is in place, the convention would hope to establish a framework for reigning in overspending, overtaxing and over-regulating by the federal government and moving toward a less centralized federal government.

I asked him if any Democrats have signed on. "We've tried to get Democrats involved, but the Democratic Party is pushing back hard to keep any Democrats from attending." Long says while one California Democratic legislator has expressed interest, he thinks that Southern and some Western states (but not California) will get behind the idea, though he admits achieving the goal will be difficult.

Because both parties have failed to curtail the escalating size, reach and cost of centralized government, Long says, "States' rights have been trampled -- rendering the 10th amendment, (which protects state rights), almost meaningless." He adds, "The bigger modern-day threat to America is not a runaway convention, but a runaway federal government."

Call it a "Long shot," but it is one worth attempting. The Preamble to the Constitution begins: "We the people." It is the people who lend power to the federal government. If the people lend it, the people can also reclaim it when government exceeds its constitutional authority.

Sen. David Long may have discovered the only path left for attaining fiscal solvency. If he succeeds, future generations might recall Dec. 7, not only for Pearl Harbor, but for the beginning of a second American Revolution.

[stevie_d_64]

Is this guy a part of that groups effort you were talking about last week???

[Sybeck1]

This of course is Mark Levin initial idea

[Publius]

The ABA Report lays out the reasons why the commissioners who wrote the report believe that delegates to an Amendments Convention would be elected by the people of the states on a "One Man/One Vote" basis. The reason is Reynolds v. Sims and their belief that it would govern an Amendments Convention. One other reason is that the original Convention of 1787 was held under the rules of the Articles of Confederation, and those rules were superseded by the Constitution.

I would recommend printing off both reports to which I linked and reading them carefully.

In the end, Congress can do certain things to blunt the efforts of the states:

• Congress can attempt to refuse to call a convention. ALEC thinks that the courts would get involved and use the old Powell decision to tell Congress to do its duty. Even ABA sees that as a likely outcome. Others believe that the courts would view it as a political question and let the people remove recalcitrant senators and congressmen in elections if they truly want an Amendments Convention.
• Congress can attempt to regulate the Convention. ABA believes this is a prerogative of Congress and lays out the arguments under the Dillon and Coleman decisions as to why this is so. ALEC believes that the states own and operate the Convention, and Congress has no authority to do anything but set the time and place of the Convention.
• Congress can create its own weak amendments trimming its power and refuse to call a convention. This is how Congress weaseled out of a convention in 1913 over the 17th Amendment. But Congress had a legal technicality in that case. Several states had said in their petitions for a convention that if Congress passed an amendment to the states permitting the direct election of senators, their petitions would be considered as discharged. Once Congress did that, those few petitions were considered discharged, and the two-thirds threshold was no longer met.

So how do I think it will play out?

• If 34 or more states can agree on identical language, Congress will not have a legal leg to stand on, and rather than let the federal courts get involved, Congress will swallow hard and set the time and place of the Amendments Convention.
• Congress will then resurrect Orrin Hatch's bill of 1991 that would place strict rules on the Convention. It would be best if it doesn't pass. But if it passes, the states will go to federal court to argue that Congress has overstepped its bounds by getting involved in a state matter.
• The Supreme Court will either add on to the Dillon and Coleman decisions by letting the new law stand, or it will throw the law out and let the states run things. It will be a 5-4 decision either way.

[Jacquerie]

Thank you.

Article V ping!

[Jacquerie]

Senator Long and the Indiana legislature got going last July, about a month before Mark’s book went public.

I’m not aware of any connection between Long and ConventionofStates.com.

BTW, Convention of States is looking for state volunteers and leaders. (hint)

[boxlunch]

BTTT

[Jacquerie]

There have been other movements to convene the states for the purpose of amendments.

Each time, congress stepped in to sidetrack the process.

There is no doubt congress will attempt the same.

I expect rat and rino skulduggery behind the scenes. Individual state legislators will be cajoled/bribed/threatened.

If that does not work, congress will attempt to compromise the amendments, by offering their own watered down versions.

[DoodleDawg]

The other begins at the state level, where two-thirds of the legislatures ask Congress to call "a convention for proposing amendments."

Twenty six states went for Obama in 2012. What are the chances of most of those calling for the convention, much less ratifying anything that comes out of it?

[Brad from Tennessee]

I would like to see Washington decentralized with senators and congressmen operating from offices located in their jurisdictions and conducting legislative business through teleconferences.

[Publius]

I agree. They pulled it off cleverly in 1913 when we should have had an Amendments Convention to discuss the direct election of senators.

But this time I don't think they'll be able to pull it off. It's a combination of the American people's low opinion of Congress and the ability of the Internet to disseminate information without the usual corporate filters. I see that old 1991 bill of Orrin Hatch's as the way they'll go to "tame" the Convention, but it may not survive the House or the Supreme Court.

[Amendment10]

Although I would support repealing the Progressive Movement 16th and 17th Amendments, there is nothing wrong with the Constitution per se.

The real problem with the “Constitution” is low information voters who don’t understand that the Founding States made the Constitution to limit (cripple) the federal government’s powers. And the remedy to restoring the constitutional republic is to get citizens up to speed on the federal government’s constitutionally limited powers. When that happens voters will be less likely to be tricked into voting for corrupt federal politicians who promise constitutonally indefensible federal spending programs to win votes.

But patriots are going to have to get citizens up to speed without the help of the media, including Obama guard dog Fx News, because the corrupt media is protecting the unconstitutonally big federal government.

Note that if patriots can organize to elect 2/3 conservative majority control of both Houses of Congress in the 2014 elections then the Obama tyranny will effectively be water under the bridge. This is because Congress will have the constitutional authority, under Clause 2 of Section 7 of Article I, to override presidential vetoes. In other words, Congress will be able to repeal unconstitutional Obamacare, for example, without Obama’s signature.

Congress will also be able to impeach federal government “leaders” who are not upholding their oaths to protect and defend the Constitution, particularly when it comes to respecting the federal government’s limited powers.

[Yaelle]

You would need 34 states. Which ones? My state is lib statist central (CA).

[Kaslin]

My suggestion is move to a red state

[Kevmo]

Founders wanted the states to be able to amend the Constitution as a means of checking a runaway federal government. They understood human nature and its lust for power.

***Can you please add me to your Article V ping list?

[Jacquerie]

Done!

[Repeal The 17th]

bookmark

[Repeal The 17th]

Thank you Jacquerie.

[Nuc 1.1]

Repeal the 16th. Strip the congress of the ability to writ tax law. Institute a national retail sales tax of say 15%. I would fight against more but support less. Constitutionally prohibit property taxes. Constitutionally prohibit transfer payments of any type. Repeal the 17th amendment. Constitutionally prohibit judicial review. Require a balanced budget. There are more but these are the heavy hitters necessary to protect against government mendacity. Pass all of Mark Levin’s Liberty Amendments. Some of which may seem negated by the above but you can’t trust the damn government.

[Nuc 1.1]

Well said.

[Political Junkie Too]

The liberal states will do their best to stay away from the Mount Vernon preparatory gathering and hope this effort peters out.

This is a comment worth disputing and debating. I'm not sure where it will end up, but let me tee it up.

Are we sure that a "liberal state," by virtue of its electing Congressmen and Presidents who align with the Democrat Party, are also saying that they agree with the direction that Nancy Reid and Barack Clinton are taking the country?

Could it be that "liberal states" just want to be left alone to allow abortions, marry anything, and restrict guns in much the same way that "conservative states" want to be left alone to hunt, raise their families, and participate in faith-based organizations?

I think that, aside from the New Deal as a national solution with socialist (nee liberal) tendencies to get the country out of the Great Depression, today's "liberal" agenda stems from the lessons learned from Roe v. Wade.

In Roe, the question in its simplist form was whether it was an undue hardship for a woman who resided in Texas to have to travel to Louisiana to get an abortion. She wanted to have the abortion in Texas. SCOTUS ruled, in essence, that it WAS an undue hardship for someone in a "conservative" state to have to travel to a "liberal" state for a "liberal" activity, and that the "liberal" activity must be available everywhere.

The reverberations of that line of thought have brought us gay marriage, gun bans, and environmental regulations from liberal states to conservative states, as well as restrictions on faith-based organizations and school prayer from liberal states to conservative states. It is hard to think of cultural flows the other way -- what conservative values have been forced onto liberal states? Voting reform? Immigration enforcement? Right-to-work reform?

So, is it axiomatic that "liberal states" would attempt to disrupt an Article V Convention because they want to be a part of a larger national agenda of centralization of liberal principles from Washington DC? Or would they also want to go back to a time of localization of politics?

-PJ