James Madison wrote at length about ‘factions’, what we call political parties. Political parties exist to serve the interests of their members. To the extent that they do what is right for the nation is a distant concern.
Our Framers were very well aware of the detrimental influence of political parties. Madison wrote of two solutions. The first was to establish an authoritarian government that persecuted all dissent. The second was to design a government that minimized their effects.
Parties set up right after ratification of the Constitution. They developed in the 19th century and came to dominate congressional, senatorial and presidential nomination processes. BUT the Framers design, especially a senate of the states, minimized the harm done by parties.
That all flew out the window with passage of the 17th Amendment. No longer did the structure of government minimize the effect of political parties. Over the course of a hundred years, two nominally distinct factions have melded into essentially one interest, and that interest has nothing to do with the general welfare. The democrat and pubbie wings of the Uniparty have far more in common than their public rhetoric suggests.
We see it all the time as the GOP leadership clearly prefers more democrats in government than Tea Party or Trumpian usurpers.
Like the two-dimensional characters in Edwin Abbot’s “Flatland,” too many of us cannot imagine a third dimension. Yet, the Framers spelled it out to us in Article V. The people’s sovereignty has been stolen. Thieves do not willingly return stolen goods. It is up to us to think outside of the two-dimensional framework of Uniparty government, which cannot possibly restore our nation to free government.
I, too, pray that I am horribly mistaken but fear that I am not.
Senators used to essentially be 2 ambassadors from the legislature of each state to the federal government. If they failed to represent that state, they were removed when their term was up. (Is there a case where a legislature removed one earlier? That would be fascinating.)
In any case, everything entrusted to the senate in the constitution was premised on those senators being ambassadors from their state legislature. Impeachment trial...what each state legislature thought. Treaty...what each legislature thought. Confirmation of judges and officials...what each legislature thought.
Why does this matter? Imagine the old senate debating a national health care plan? Imagine a debate about giving benefits to indigent foreigners going on our welfare system. How would it be different if that senator knew he was working for his state legislature?