Posted on 09/09/2015 12:46:09 PM PDT by Jacquerie
Our governing system no longer serves its intended purpose, to secure the blessings of liberty.
Any casual read of the Constitution reveals our government’s wholesale departure from it. Congress gaffs off or assigns its duties to craft legislation, determine spending, ratify treaties, oversee the executive branch, and regulate the judicial branch. Not being content with rewriting statutes, Scotus increasingly elevates itself above God; its Obergefell v. Hodges ruling is only the latest outrage among many. Executive branch agencies reflect the will of one man, Obama, and not congressional statutes. In response, there is a small but growing minority of Americans who believe revolution is our fate.
Yet, there is a peaceful way to stop and reverse our slide into tyranny.
First, get out of the mindset that one person, a president, can save us. We have slipped from free, limited government precisely because power has become concentrated in the executive and judicial branches.
The solution is to reverse this concentration of power, to diffuse power once again across fifty member republics, the states.
With these words, “The 17th Amendment is hereby repealed,” the Framers’ careful, vertical separation of powers would be restored. Instead of free-lancing, at-large senators responsible to nothing more than their reelections, the interests of fifty other governments would once again have a voice in the larger republic.
Would freedom be immediately restored? Of course not; one hundred years of rot cannot be reversed overnight, yet there would certainly be some instant benefits. Think anti-10th Amendment lawyers would have a shot at the federal bench? No way. Senators would no longer walk on eggshells in constant fear of the media, of a national PC Police always ready make their electoral life miserable. Senators would be responsible to angry states fed up with open borders, EPA regulations and other administrative diktats too numerous to count.
Article V of the Constitution makes provision for the states to initiate this all-important structural change, repeal of the 17th Amendment that our nation so desperately needs.
When acting in our sovereign capacity in convention, there is no earthly power above We the People. Black chattel slavery was banned by Constitutional amendment. Along with the 17th Amendment, Obamacare and Obergefell can be repealed/overturned via Article V. So can Roe v. Wade.
Rather than roll the dice in armed revolt, and at best risk ending up with an Oliver Cromwell rather than a George Washington, We the People can go around the DC Uniparty, avoid violence, and calmly initiate the structural changes on which our freedoms depend.
There is little time to save the American Republic. Press your state assemblyman and senator to do their duty. The tools to save ourselves and our posterity are in our hands. Let’s use them.
Article V now!
Yes Article V is needed.
The problem is the news media and the government schools made sure that hardly anyone knows about Article V , real history, states’ rights, nor hardly anything about the Constitution.
Sorta like only allowing the people represented are the only ones who can “BUY” the seat,huh?
Sure would make the Wall St. Types unhappy.....
Rockyfella no longer buy West Virginny//I like it..
Could also pass a new law saying same..candidates can ONLY take money from folks in their districts....
I think it's a little deeper than that. And yes on Article V. It would be a critical step to identifying the two Americas. Hurry before it's three or four Americas.
The fault is ours. Abe will explain from "the other side."
If you could first know where you are and whither you are tending, you could better judge what to do and how to do it. You initiated a policy to tolerate the Marxist-Alinsky radicals and let them rant; not only has it not ceased but was constantly augmented by decades of infiltration and indoctrination. You now have two Americas. In my opinion, it will not cease until a crisis shall have been reached and passed. A house divided against itself cannot stand. I believe this government cannot endure, permanently, half statist and half free; I do not expect the house to fall; but I do expect it will cease to be divided. It will become all one thing, or all the other.
The question today is either the opponents of statism will arrest the further spread of it and place it on course of ultimate extinction, or its advocates will push it forward till it shall become permanent.
Have you no tendency to the latter condition?
For those who may need it.
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.
.
To repeat the reply of Mr. Frankin to the question of “What kind of Government do we have?”
“A Repblic.”
“If We can keep it.”
Without the federal convention of 1787, most of the delegates to it would be unknown to us. Not all were by any means virtuous, but in convention they dealt with regional and personal interests, and designed a good government.
The 2015 congressman who would sell the rights of millions today for campaign cash would never think of harming his family. Michele Bachmann was run out of congress for being virtuous in a corrupt institution; she refused to conform. Had she joined the sleaze and venality that typifies congress, she could be there today. What I describe is identical to the behavioral difference between men in strip clubs and church.
The states will send serious men/women of character and judgment armed with commissions to promote their state supported amendments. Delegates to an amendment convention will be unconcerned with that which drives congress: money, personal power, and reelection will not be their focus or interest. We can have every expectation that state delegates will rise to the occasion. They will understand the gravity of their assignment and conduct themselves in a manner precisely opposite that of congress.
So true. Imagine the public debate that a state lead Article V push would encourage. It would be incredibly educational for most Americans.
If you think the Feds would voluntarily give up centralized power by repealing the 17th Amendment, then you are delusional.
......and scare the hell out of Congress and the political classes embedded with them.......................
Why not. California’s wacko state legislature couldn’t do any worse at electing our senators than California’s wacko voting majority.
***
The amendatory process under Article V consists of three steps: Proposal, Disposal, and Ratification.
Proposal:
There are two ways to propose an amendment to the Constitution.
Article V gives Congress and an Amendments Convention exactly the same power to propose amendments, no more and no less.
Disposal:
Once Congress, or an Amendments Convention, proposes amendments, Congress must decide whether the states will ratify by the:
The State Ratifying Convention Method has only been used twice: once to ratify the Constitution, and once to ratify the 21st Amendment repealing Prohibition.
Ratification:
Depending upon which ratification method is chosen by Congress, either the state legislatures vote up-or-down on the proposed amendment, or the voters elect a state ratifying convention to vote up-or-down. If three-quarters of the states vote to ratify, the amendment becomes part of the Constitution.
Forbidden Subjects:
Article V contains two explicitly forbidden subjects and one implicitly forbidden subject.
Explicitly forbidden:
Implicitly forbidden:
Reference works:
Proposing Constitutional Amendments by a Convention of the States: A Handbook for State Lawmakers
State Initiation of Constitutional Amendments: A Guide for Lawyers and Legislative Drafters
I know you should read the column before posting.
Then war it shall be.
...Wasn't the Mississippi Republican primary also run by state elected officials?
Since there is no precedent for an Article V convention, guess who will be arbitrating the exact mechanisms on how it will be run???? Chief Justice Roberts, The Ninth Circuit court in California, Judge Bunning in Kentucky and other folks like that.
Get with it. We lost.
Self goverment, like free market capitalism, was a fun 18th century experiment. Unfortunately, the instinct of men to control other men is far too great of a thing for any enlightened system to compete with.
There is an inherent flaw in Article V thinking.
It allows those that would be most affected by our initiation and conclusion of Article V practices, to still exist in relative safety and comfort, and above the earth.
Thanks for the ping
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