Posted on 02/08/2013 3:21:06 PM PST by FatMax
The Founding Fathers knew that in order to ratify a Constitution and preserve the fledgling United States, it was essential that the states have representation in the new Federal government. The legislative branch would be split; the people represented by the directly elected members of the House of Representatives, and each state represented by two officials appointed by the state legislatures. In the new system, the House would represent the people and the Senate would represent the states. Without a federalist system of divided, enumerated, and checked powers between the federal and state governments, no union would be possible - the states, wary of potentially losing their sovereignty to an all-powerful government, would back out, and the world's most free and prosperous nation would never have become a reality.
According to the Founders' vision, so long as the U.S. senator served the state's interest, the senator would remain in power. This way, the upper house could focus on their business, not encumbered by the elections of their lower house counterparts.
But in the early 20th Century, Progressives argued that the federalist arrangement in place fostered corruption and excessive special interests in the Senate. Ignoring the original intent of the Constitution and under the cover of "democracy" (we are in fact a constitutional republic, not a democracy), the federal government quickly ratified the 17th Amendment, establishing the direct election of U.S. senators. States no longer had any representation in Washington, and the amendment paved the way for even more corruption and special interest influence.
Today, we have a Senate that regularly passes legislation contrary to the interests of the states, thanks to the moral hazard introduced by the 17th Amendment. Perhaps most residents in your state opposes national healthcare, but both of your senators voted in favor. Why not? They can't be recalled at moment's notice by the state legislative branch, like they could 100 years ago. All they have to do is get enough votes from their citizens - or perhaps enough voter fraud - and they are safe for six years. Missouri may not want Obamacare and Wyoming may not want tough new gun control laws, but thanks to the 17th Amendment, the state's hands are tied.
What if the 17th Amendment was repealed?
Currently, there are 52 Democrats, 46 Republicans, and two Independents, both of whom caucus with the Democrats. But in state legislative branches there are 51% Republicans and only 46% Democrats - nearly an exact opposite of the party makeup of the U.S. Senate. And that doesn't include the non-partisan unicameral Nebraska state legislature; it isn't a stretch to suggest that a state that virtually always sends Republicans to Washington would somehow depart from the trend.
Below is a map displaying the party makeup of the 50 states and how they are represented in the U.S. Senate. The varying shades of red and blue signify the % of majority control, either Republican (red), or Democrat (blue). Click here or on the image to see the full-size version.
Now, another map - this time red represents a Republican delegation, blue Democrat (or Democrat/Independent as both Independent senators caucus with the Democrats), and purple for a split D/R delegation. Click here or on the image to see the full-size version.
It is likely in a state like Hawaii - with over 90% Democrat majority control of the state houses - would have two Democrat U.S. senators. But few states have such a strong majority control. If the 17th Amendment were to be magically repealed today, returning selection to the states, it is highly probable that states would appoint senators according to party makeup of the state legislatures. A state with more Democrats would be more likely to appoint more Democrats and vise-versa. A state that was more balanced would be forced to compromise and would be more likely to have a split delegation. It is unlikely that South Dakota, a state whose voters elected nearly 80% Republicans, would only appoint one Republican senator. And it is also unlikely that a state like Michigan, where nearly two out of every three state legislators are Republican, would somehow appoint both senators from the minority party.
My theory is that if the 17th Amendment were repealed, states with 67% majority control of the state legislature or more would likely appoint two senators from the majority party, and states with less than 67% majority control would have insufficient leverage and be forced to moderate, nominating one member from each party. Non-partisan Nebraska, with all Republican officials, will stay Republican in this experiment, and both Independent senators are not a factor since they already caucus with the Democrats anyways.
Below is my proposed results, considering the makeup of the U.S. Senate and all 50 state legislatures in January 2013. Click here or on the image to see the full-size version.
According to the hypothesis, Republicans would gain an astonishing 12 seats from Democrats, a strong majority at 58 versus the Democrats' 40. There are many factors that are not accounted for in this study, such as voter fraud, the varying platform and history of each politician, media coverage, etc. But regardless of the varying and impossible-to-predict factors in a system with millions of voters, the overall premise remains: that the stronger majority control a state legislature has, the more likely it is that the state will appoint a member of the majority party. Even if only half of the seats predicted actually change hands, the Republicans would still gain control of the Senate - 52 seats to the Democrats' 46.
Corruption must be checked and the Senate should do the bidding of the state - not the special interests. But a constitutional republic is a rule of laws, not a rule of men, as is a democracy. The Founding Fathers - who had a far greater intelligence than today's politician - dedicated one half of the legislative branch to the states for good reason. By repealing the 17th Amendment, we would restore the federalist system that kept Americans free and prosperous.
Chris Carter
Director, The Victory Institute
You are in complete denial here. Sorry, pal. But you’re not getting Patrick Henry for a Senator with a 17th repeal. You’re gonna have armies of Tom Davises, John Warners and Linwood Holtons serving for eons. With “Republicans” like those, who needs Democrats ?
Whose arguing? You love the Progressive movement of the early 20th century so much you defend a progressive amendment that isn’t even near to being repealed on a forum called ironically - FREE REPUBLIC. One wonders why? What are your fears? Why so stressed? Can’t handle the truth? Marxists are like that too I’ve noticed.
What I'd like to see discussed is the impact that repealing the 17th has on campaign fundraising.
As I've posted many times over the years, it's my belief that modern party bloc politics is the result of the need for 1/3rd of the Senators to have to raise millions of dollars for 33 of the most expensive elections every two years. It takes something like a National Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee to oversee the NATIONAL raising of funds to be distributed across all the Senate election within the party. Senators just have to adhere to the national party platform (and NOT individual states interests) to share in the combined fundraising.
You don't see this kind of coordinated party fundraising across 435 House races. Also, you don't see a lot of sharing between the Presidential campaign fundraising and the Congressional races. So it's the 33 Senate races every two years that drives the coordinated party bloc fundraising.
Therefore, if you eliminate the need for Senate elections, I believe you will also weaken the party's hold on individual Senators to the voting bloc, because the fundraising hook is no longer there with which to threaten the Senator, like they do today.
Repealing the 17th amendment is really campaign finance reform at its purest.
-PJ
Your staunch opposition of the repeal - full of logical fallacies, an absence of reason, and plenty of emotional elitism - has led me to the conclusion that you are happy with the current situation. Is that the case?
You may portray senators - prior to the 17th Amendment’s passage - as corrupt elitists, but you ignore or chose not to address the fact that since today’s senators are elected by the people that they are somehow less corrupt. Throughout 5,000 years of human history, politicians have proven themselves to be corrupt elitists. Instead of halting corruption, the 17th Amendment opened the door to far more corruption. Once the states no longer had representation and U.S. senators no longer had to answer to the states, the size of the federal government exploded and the budget grew exponentially.
Words like democracy sound wonderful and from a psychological aspect are quite effective (although misleading in this case), but we now have 100 years of history to examine. The 17th Amendment is not a suicide pact and should be re-examined to determine whether it is the best path forward for a more prosperous society.
Words have meanings - you aren't helping your argument by making up your own definitions. I have never heard of a democratic constitutional republic, and the United States certainly isn't one. And it is absurd to suggest that by wanting to return to the original intent that we are wanting to turn our country into North Korea.
Democracy can strip a man's rights just as easy as a king. That is why the Founders created a federalist system of checks and balances and shared power between the federal and state government, with divided, enumerated powers for each.
Hey, I logically respond to your points, which you continually ignore. You’re the one who wants to empower politicians at the expense of the people. Politicians have too much power already. Pointing out these truths to you and your compatriots seems to result in personal attacks, f-bombs, scatological references and foot-stomping. Not exactly Conservative behavior.
An interesting theory, but I dismiss it out of hand. If you believe these Senators will stop raising money with the repeal of the 17th, I have a bridge I’d like to sell you. These folks would still be raising millions (if not billions, when you add in the whole lot) to influence their own elections and making sure THEIR people were returned to the legislature. Basically, the only thing that would change is you empower the politicians beyond where they’re already at. That’s the last thing we need to be doing at this point.
Again, Max, it is not Billy & I who have been besieging this thread with personal attacks and the like over a disagreement. I’ve frankly been shocked by the behavior of pro-17th repealers, not only in this thread, but in others, who behave more like a mob out of “Les Miserables.” I don’t question the high-minded motives of those wanting a better government, it’s that the problem that those pushing for this fail to ponder what would actually result.
It’s like the academics. They have their theories that always work on paper, but when put into motion in reality, ends up something far different. I study the realities of what the state legislatures are, who populates them and controls them, the state of our political parties, the current culture and all those other ingredients that are left out by the repealers. The resulting mishmosh is a completely inedible substance.
Too many here are believing that repeal would immediately lead to some political nirvana, a modern day era of good feelings, some early 19th century vision. Again, unless you’re planning on changing the current culture, the folks who participate in elections, virtually the entire society and remove it to, say, exclusively enlightened and educated White male landowners, and absent a parasitic class of low and no information political participants, you’re not going to have the Senate of your fantasy.
Are you up to the task of setting forth your complete philosophy for popularly elected senators, or will you continue to take the easy route and troll for columns that defend the Article I of our Framers?
If you are up to it, which I doubt, I look forward to your vanity post.
Yawn. I have history on my side. You don’t. Rather than repeat your cheap shots, get on with a comprehensive, stand alone, vanity post of how well the popularly elected Senators protect republican freedom.
Before I do, I want to make sure I understand your point.
These folks would still be raising millions (if not billions, when you add in the whole lot) to influence their own elections...
Since the premise of this discussion is that their own elections are eliminated, am I to presume that you're talking about Senators influencing the members of the state legislatures who would appoint them with money? Isn't that what got Rod Blagojevich thrown in prison?
...and making sure THEIR people were returned to the legislature.
By this I presume that you are saying that Senators would be raising funds to see that their puppets are voted into state assemblies and senates. I don't have a problem with this. That's local politics. If the Senator can raise money while in Washington, DC, to aid somebody in a rural county in Nebraska, go for it.
I would suspect that over time, several roadblocks would emerge:
1) why would a special-interest lobbyist in DC care about a local state assembly candidate half-way across the country?
2) What about quid pro quo? It wasn't too long ago when this used to be something we cared about. I believe it was with the Clinton administration that the MSM began to look the other way when Clinton traded favors for funding.
3) Would this need to stack state governments be enough to hold together a national party bloc organized around campaign fundraising?
Are we really going to start seeing $10 million campaigns for one or two assembly districts with a few hundred thousand voters, at most? Bear in mind that many state districts do not align with federal congressional districts, so there may not be natural synergies to leverage.
Basically, the only thing that would change is you empower the politicians beyond where they’re already at. That’s the last thing we need to be doing at this point.
I'm not seeing it. Sorry. It would take too much attention from a Senator to mastermind that kind of local control over elections while still performing his duties as a Senator in Washington, in a way that is coordinated with the others Senators in his party. That kind of national Senatoral Election Campaign Committee would become too large to manage.
-PJ
It becomes exceedingly pointless writing anything of substance to you when you continually fail to respond to my points and stomp your feet with a tantrum when you predictably lose the argument.
So things will get worse, just because you say so? No one is stomping off - this is a good discussion - and the debate is certainly not over, as you have proclaimed.
This isn't 1913 all over again; we have 100 years of history to learn from. I don't trust anyone voting for me that isn't accountable for their decisions. Go to Wal-Mart - under direct democracy, those wonderful individuals (quite likely a great portion of whom are paying for their goods with YOUR money) are the ones selecting your senators. Are they going to care that the decisions your senators make in Washington has a negative effect on your liberties and prosperity? No - because it isn't going to directly affect them. Go ahead and raise taxes. Go ahead and send troops to Syria, Libya, and Uganda. They don't pay taxes, don't serve in the military, don't own a business, and don't ever have to wonder bow they are going to pay for their healthcare or where there next paycheck is coming from.
On the other hand, state legislators (typically) care primarily about getting elected, then about getting re-elected, then gaining and growing their political power. This is constant throughout human history. But unlike U.S. senators, state legislators LIVE with the people they represent. You regularly see them at community functions, restaurants, the store, etc. How often have you ever met your U.S. senator? Probably never, because they don't work for you or the state; they work for the federal government.
By amending the Constitution, we opened the gates of Senate corruption from a largely individual and relatively local scale to a massive national and international scale. Of course there was plenty of corruption prior to the amendment, but on a much smaller scale and removed any state representation from the federal government.
It all comes down to accountability; the indigent members of society aren't accountable for their actions, so they are free to vote for politicians that may be corrupt, but they are offering "free" stuff (that their opponents will allegedly take away) if only they are elected. Meanwhile, state legislatures are still corruptible, but are more accountable because their power and re-election chances are at stake. If irresponsible people or corruptible politicians don't have consequences for their actions, then they will go about as far as they can get away with. All we need to do is find the best path forward to fix corruption and restore the rule of law. The Founders undoubtedly had corruption and an ignorant/apathetic/destructive population in mind when they wrote and approved the Constitution.
What history is on your side ? You keep repeating that mantra as if it means anything at all. How about keeping to discussing the reality of what WILL happen with repeal ? That’s something you and your compatriots don’t want to address, because it destroys your house of cards argument.
Again, with the fallacies? Building a racist strawman to knock down isn’t helping your cause. And history is on history’s side, not yours or any one else’s; cherry-picking information and rewriting it to fit your preconceptions isn’t solving anything.
And maybe it is fantasyland to want a society with individual liberty and prosperity protected by limited, but effective, government. But folks probably said the same thing to the Founding Fathers, and you are now free to enjoy the fruits of their labor.
Title it: "In Defense of the 17th Amendment."
Methinks the FieldMarshal doth protest too much...He is a progressive, and they can never seem to leave IT alone.
That which you refused to read in my previous posts.
Take a breath, maybe a couple days and explain your Senatorial philosophy to Freeperdom in detail.
Are you up to it? Is it a deal?
Maybe we can all agree that corruption must be fought, politicians are corrupt, and the current system isn’t perfect.
Instead of attacking each other, we would be better off discussing the problem and finding the best path forward.
The best path forward is to go back and repeal the 17th amendment.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.