Posted on 12/06/2016 2:31:55 PM PST by george76
The 17th Amendment, which allowed the popular election of U.S. senators, “disenfranchised” state legislatures and altered the U.S. Constitution's checks and balances, Chapman University Law Professor John Eastman told an audience of state legislators in Washington, D.C. last week.
The amendment made it easier for Congress to pass legislation, which eventually led to the massive growth in federal power that the states are still grappling with today...
“What the founders did is come up with this counterintuitive notion that adding an extra layer of government would provide less government and greater liberty. And it only worked if those governments were in competition with and in conflict with each other,”
That all went away when we disenfranchised .. the states from a role in the federal government by removing their ability to choose the senators,” ..
Before the ratification of the 17th Amendment in 1913, each state legislature chose the state’s two U.S. senators while House members were elected by popular vote. This meant that the interests of the state would also be represented at the federal level.
...
the 17th Amendment has drastically altered the system of checks and balances that the founders carefully designed.
...
The 17th Amendment “has been a significant factor in turning what originally was a federation of state governments into a national system, where the federal government sits firmly on top of the states
...
Who are senators dependent on today? The media. The donors. The special interests. Right? They’re dependent on everybody but the states whom they were originally intended to represent here in the nation’s capital
(Excerpt) Read more at cnsnews.com ...
I agree!
Through an Article V Convention of the States.
That’s progressive bullshit.
Now we have an entire Federal government riddled with corruption. Another utopian solution shot to hell...
Those state legislatures voted to disenfranchise themselves, though, as they had to approve the 17th amendment.
Unfortunately, public corruption was rife in that era and was a major problem in the US through the 1980s. It took the enactment of strong financial disclosure and conflict of interest laws in the 1960s and the RICO law in the 1970s to break with that past.
He’s right. It should be repealed along with the 16th.
L
Corruption was a frequent and sometimes routine problem in the federal system almost from the start. And, for what it is worth, naked corruption is less now than in any time since the founding era of the country.
Your link doesn’t work.
Naked corruption like selling million dollar contracts through a shell charity; or utilizing the full force of federal agencies to directly attack political foes; or refusing to enforce laws because they are inconvenient to political views or persons; or arming terrorists to attack a sovereign nation without a declaration of war under the auspices of defeating terrorists? Like forcing persons to purchase a product under compulsion of “law;” or invalidating the expressed will of the people without regard to Constitutional prohibition; like the seizure of property without legal recourse; like the passage of “regulations” without congressional review that carry the full weight of law and subject persons to loss of property and livelihood? Like the bribery on a scale unimaginable to any state under the guise of Federal aid—money stolen from citizens under threat of force? Oh, not that kind of corruption?
Some of us long for the petty corruption of state legislators...
DUH!
Note that all three greatly increased the power of the central government.
Something is wrong with the link.
I’ve said this before, that the 17th amendment was unconstitutional. No state shall be denied suffrage without it’s consent... means exactly that. It would have had to have been unanimously agreed to.
Add to that the scarcity of information on the internet about the ratification of the 17th amendment and you start to see what I mean.
By naked corruption in Congress, I mean votes and favors being bought for cash, Senators and Reps on a regular cash payroll from large corporations and interests, and with liquor and prostitutes routinely on offer. What you are riled about is government abuse of the citizens, which is another kind of harm. The great modern remedy against that is the development of federal civil rights law, which was primarily (but not exclusively) the work of liberals in the 1960s and after.
Absolutely correct!
The link doesn’t work for me tho.
Thanks for the link. Disregard my previous comment about the broken one.
While I agree with you about the current political parties being a major problem I also still feel the repeal of the 17th Amendment is needed. This professor only talks about part of the problem with the 17th. The 17th Amendment also removed one of the only redresses to violations of the 10th Amendment.
"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people." We had no easy recourse to the Federal Government's usurping of State's or People's jurisdictions even before the 17th Amendment was passed. With the 17th we have even less.
Exactly!
Not necessarily true. For instance, consider the fact that the GOP now controls, what, approximately 30+ state legislatures and governor's offices?
That fact would mean that the current makeup of the United States Senate, pre-17th Amendment would currently consist of at least 60 GOP Senators, which is a clear governing majority. Changing it to be by popular vote has therefore introduced a needless and undesirable layer of chaos and gridlock, IMHO.
My humble opinion is that the 17th Amendment makes the Constitution too democratic; it was was misguided, clearly weakened the representation of the States in the federal government, and diluted the ability of the majority party to effectively govern and move its agenda at the federal level.
According to my understanding of the Framers' original intent when crafting the Constitution, I therefore staunchly support the repeal of the 17th Amendment.
If the concern was related to corruption state legislatures, then the solution should have been to find a solution at that level, rather than mess up the States' representation in the US Senate, consequently weakening the power of what should be the governing party (in the current case, the GOP).
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.