Convention of States Hopes to Rein in Federal Government

Blue Ridge Now ^ | September 27th 2017 | Derek Lacey

[Jacquerie]

In his remarks at the Henderson County public library, Mike Faulkenberry, state director of the N.C. Convention of States Project, asked a crowd of about 80 people whether they felt the federal government is “doing just a bang-up job.”

None raised their hand to answer yes.

He asked whether they felt the federal government gets carried away sometimes, but for the most part does pretty well in areas such as taxes and regulations, and again none answered yes.

But when he asked who felt the federal government “is completely out of control,” hands went up across the room.

The Convention of States Project is an effort to hold a convention of states to rein in the federal government, focusing specifically on term limits, fiscal restraint and reducing and restraining its power and jurisdiction. “We all agree that the federal government is just broken; it doesn’t work anymore,” he said. “It certainly doesn’t work anything like the way that the founders intended for it to work and that the framers of the Constitution dictated that it work.”

Faulkenberry led a discussion Tuesday night at the library about the Convention of States Project’s effort. He said the government can be fixed, but those in power will never fix it themselves.

The framers of the Constitution knew three things were necessary for good government, he said: that the people need to pay attention and vet who they elect in order to send good people to office, that those people implement good policy, and that a good structure is imperative for the other two.

That structure is the Constitution, he explained, but “that’s where we have dropped the ball a lot, is by allowing the structure, the Constitution, that the framers did such a wonderful job with, (to) be distorted, be changed, be modified, in some cases be ignored, and instead, we’ve got what we’ve got now.”

The fix, though, is also in the Constitution, he said — in Article V, a convention of the states. “It’s time we step up and do something about it,” Faulkenberry said.

Article V provides ways to amend the Constitution: that two-thirds of both houses of Congress can propose amendments when they deem it necessary, or that two-thirds of the legislatures of the states call for a convention.

Regardless of which of those two ways an amendment is proposed, the Article provides that the amendment must then be ratified by either three-fourths of the states’ legislatures or by conventions in three-fourths of the states, with Congress to decide which.

One chamber in 13 states saying no or saying nothing, Faulkenberry explained, would prevent the passage of the amendment. Of the country’s 99 state legislative bodies, it would take only 13 to stop it.

“That’s a really high bar — a really high bar — and it should be,” he said. “We shouldn’t amend the Constitution lightly.”

For North Carolina, Senate Joint Resolution 36, “A joint resolution applying to Congress for an Article V convention of the states with the purpose of proposing amendments to the United States Constitution,” has passed the Senate and is set to be considered by the House.

State Reps. Chuck McGrady and Cody Henson and State Sen. Chuck Edwards are all in favor of the measure, and both McGrady and Edwards were on hand Tuesday night to discuss their position.

[peyton randolph]

“The only thing close to consensus as an amendment is balanced budget and that’s only because everyone still has their own idea about how it will work.”

******

Bingo.

Fiscal conservatives view a balanced budget amendment as a means to cut socialist spending and rein in FedGov by reducing the power of the purse.

In contrast, the establishment views a balanced budget amendment as a means to raise taxes to match spending by the leviathan. It’s the perfect mechanism to blame for runaway spending instead of the who are politicians voting for both the discretionary spending and the related mandatory tax hikes.