Posted on 11/09/2021 10:14:24 AM PST by cotton1706
Former Rep. Mark Walker (R-N.C.) has fielded phone calls from GOP officials in North Carolina and Washington urging him to drop his Senate bid and return to the House.
Walker confirmed the calls in an interview with the Carolina Journal, though he said that he is still currently running for the GOP nomination to replace retiring Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) next year.
Walker is one of three current or former Republican elected officials vying to replace Burr. He announced his campaign late last year, though what little polling there is in the GOP primary shows him trailing his two top rivals, former Gov. Pat McCrory and Rep. Ted Budd (R-N.C.), who has already been endorsed by former President Donald Trump.
Before running for the Senate, Walker served three terms in the House after emerging from the GOP primary to succeed longtime Rep. Howard Coble (R-N.C.).
(Excerpt) Read more at msn.com ...
Trump endorsed Budd, and he will likely be the nominee (McCrory is an Establishment hack).
So in a two man race, Budd defeats McCrory in the primary and gets elected next November to succeed the odious Richard Burr.
If we’d repeal the 17th amendment, none of this nonsense would be necessary. It would be up to the state legislature and/or governor to appoint senators. We need to repeal a number of BS amendments to fix some of our biggest problems.
Yeah we would get no RINOs at all doing that right?
It doesn’t matter! The original intent of the Founders was that the people vote their representatives, and their respective state representatives send “emissaries” on behalf of the state government to represent their interests in DC. That’s how a senator worked in many republics past.
We messed that up in the early 20th century not to mention locking our representatives at 435 in the 1920s. Prior to that, new reps were seated every 10 years with the completion of the census. We need to ratify Article the First while we’re at it. One rep for every 50K citizens. Our system is broken.
The public would mindlessly scream “You’re talking away my right to vote !”.
If McCrory wins the nomination, and runs the same type of campaign he ran when running for reelection for governor, the Democrats will be picking up a Senate seat.
“Yeah we would get no RINOs at all doing that right?”
It sure as hell couldn’t be any worse than what we have right now.
And we’d never have to worry that a fiscal Conservative would ever be elected again to the Senate, except by accident.
Not mindless, since it’s true. You think empowering politicians is the way to go at this point ? I wouldn’t trust my state legislators to elect the local dogcatcher.
That’s for sure!
I don’t have too big a problem with mine.
Anyway its what the Founding Fathers intended. They wanted the states to have a direct say in the Federal Government. Now they don’t have that. I think incompetent state legislator or not they still would do better then the state-wide “Prom King\Queen” election that is done now. “Prom Kings\Queens” are selected for governor and other state wide office. Perhaps that’s enough ! Think of it as “diversity” of election procedure. (Isn’t “diversity” always great?) Making a senator a super-congresscritter has certainly been demonstrated as not the way to go. Anyway every state legislator will think he\she can be senator, that ego dirven idea can be leveraged. I am sure there were Delaware state legislators that looked at Biden and said to themselves but for the 17th Amendment it could be me ? Yes they could be a doofus, but at worst there would be just another doofus along in 6 years. Dofus or not the state’s interest would be better served. Not necessarily more honestly served but still better then what’s done currently.
Unfortunately, what the Founding Fathers wanted proved to be a failure in a matter of decades. They put no teeth into it. As soon as a Senator discovered they weren’t legally (Constitutionally) obligated to obey the legislature’s instructions on how to vote and they could ride out the 6 years and hope their party or supporters would return to power and reelect them, it was a failure.
I’ve debated this issue with the anti-17th crowd for many years, backwards and forwards, but I’ve come to the conclusion after much research that repeal wouldn’t yield what its boosters for legislatively-elected Senators want. They want statesmen above the proverbial fray who will jealously protect states rights. Sounds great, but that’s not going to happen. You’re going to elect an all-fiscal spendthrift coterie with the explicit instructions to loot the treasury (or rather, leave tens of trillions more of IOU’s) on behalf of their state. You don’t want to do that ? You’re politically dead.
Both Dem and GOP states alike will send this same kind of person, sadly. We’re way far past getting Henry Clays again.
“....As soon as a Senator discovered they weren’t legally (Constitutionally) obligated to obey the legislature’s instructions on how to vote and they could ride out the 6 years and hope their party or supporters would return to power and reelect them, it was a failure.....”
Could you please name some pre-April 8, 1913 examples (that is pre-17th) so I can research this ?
Well, I can give you a key one: MS Sen. Blanche Kelso Bruce (R). The Dems reclaimed the legislature before the end of his 6-year term. He obviously, as a Black Republican, would not follow the instructions of a White Supremacist Dem legislature. Worse yet for him, he couldn’t return to the state for almost half his term because of death threats.
You could also cite KS GOP Sen. Edmund Ross, who refused to vote for President Andrew Johnson’s impeachment (which would’ve been the preference of every GOP legislature in 1868) and hung on until his term expired in 1871 (he eventually became a Dem).
Another that springs to mind would be the legendary and long-serving Missouri Senator Thomas Hart Benton, who was running afoul of the legislature by his last term (and as a Democrat, he was replaced with a Whig).
I’d dare say you could find countless examples of Senators discovering their “independence” from state legislators demanding they vote in the opposite. Ultimately, because the Founding Fathers didn’t “put any teeth” into how a Senator could be removed (meaning that a simple majority vote by a given legislature could oust them and then immediately vote on a replacement), this was going to fail, and it did.
If we’d repeal the 17th amendment, none of this nonsense would be necessary.
From your keyboard to God’s ears.....
IMO your examples don’t really prove your point.
1. Bruce - I doubt seriously if would have mattered if he had followed the legislators instructions down to the capital or noncapital letter, comma, period and semicolon. He was viewed by the legislature as a black carpetbagger and that was that ! He had to go ! The issue was race & revenge not politics.
2. Ross - Was the state legisture asked its opinion? Is there a record of their instructions directing his vote? If not this is what you surmise to be the case. It may be or not be. Ross lost his bid for re-election two years later. If his Johnson impeachment vote was the issue his re-election hung on he paid a price for his action. The legislature refused to send him back as was their Constitutional right. In the mind of the state legislature he was acting against the interests of the state.
3. Benton - He opposed the Compromise of 1850 as too favorable to pro-slavery interests. This stance damaged Benton’s popularity in Missouri, and the state legislature denied him re-election in 1851. Again a senator paid an electoral price for antagonizing the state legislature. Again in the mind of the state legislature he was acting against the interests of the state.
To me in 2 of your 3 examples the old system clearly worked ! The legislative-picked senators served their Constitutional term but in that term ran afoul of their state legislatures wishes and were negatively rewarded for it.
So you don’t subscribe to Edmund Burke’s maxim that a legislator shouldn’t just parrot his constitients views and demands but one who exercises his judgement. If his constitients find his judgement wrong then they can replace him. In cases 2 & 3 they did ! The first one Bruce is simply a pathological case and proves little.
I disagree, and while you may explain away the three examples, it’s still ultimately a rationalization and my central point still remains here.
The point, of course, being that by the strict standards, they’re supposed to follow the legislature’s instructions given to them on how to vote. This is the entire point of having the legislature vote on their Senators. Once that’s been breached, with respect to the aforementioned 3 examples, you have a Senator who is disregarding, indeed betraying, the explicit intent/desire of the Founding Fathers with respect to states rights.
They naively expected the gentlemen whom would be elected would follow that method and would stand aside if they could not follow instructions, and as we soon realized when it comes to power, being a gentleman can go right out the window. The first thing to go.
Actually I think you’re doing as much rationalization as I am maybe more.
“...Senator who is disregarding, indeed betraying, the explicit intent/desire of the Founding Fathers with respect to states rights....”
And when a Senator does that the legislature should remove him\her by not re-electing him\her! As they did in 2 of those 3 examples.
So Edmund Burke is incorrect in your view?
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