by Smitty
You may have seen this a few years back:
That ad comes to mind reading Noah Rothman over at Hot Air as he surveys a few recent URLs concerning the Convention of States notion. Rothman makes a fair point: there is no risk-free way to revisit our founding document:
For conservatives who ostensibly venerate the Constitution, it is odd to see so many of them fail to acknowledge that proposing it’s[sic] complete revision undermines their political position dramatically. Displaying respect for the Founders’ ideals and creating the conditions whereby their work might be entirely demolished are mutually exclusive.
Do you mean the way Wilson planted the IED in the form of Amendments 16 & 17, plus the Federal Reserve Act back in 1913? Or do you mean the way the size of the House froze in 1910, making our government substantially less representative?
Many on the right have contended that a Convention of States is distinct from a constitutional convention. What’s more, they might say, that process could be the only way to rein in the unelected elements of the federal government, like the judiciary or the nation’s unwieldy and proliferating regulatory agencies. Some on the right contend that the Constitution has been so perverted that it is already essentially defunct. But these same conservatives, who often lament the fact that Republican lawmakers are so regularly rolled by left-wing organizations and liberal politicians, would be foolish to vest in these GOP officeholders the authority to remake the system entirely. They would quickly find that conservative politicians who regularly fail to outmaneuver liberals in Congress don’t find their luck has improved on the convention floor.
OK, so: do the homework. Got it.
From a conservative perspective, the ideals and priorities of those who came of age in the Enlightenment are vastly superior to the self-obsession that masquerades as political principle today. The document that emerges from a modern convention would not look anything like the 18th Century accord that harnessed human imperfection and utilized one man’s basest impulses to check another’s. That divinely inspired document, while perhaps flawed and frequently misinterpreted, remains preferable to the technocratic, anti-federalist charter that would emerge from a 2015 convention (presuming that anything at all could possibly pass such a body).
Perhaps I’m putting too fine a point on it, but I wouldn’t go further than “divinely informed”, and even that’s a stretch. The Constitution is a secular product. Full stop.
“preferable to the technocratic, anti-federalist charter that would emerge”
Again, that’s precisely where Wilson’s Folly has taken us. The guy at the table is choking. Technology is seeing progressively oppressive use. Technology should liberate, instead.
When liberals like Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg gush over national charters like South Africa’s 19-year-old constitution, they are often only fetishizing the new and the foreign. That’s a nagging and unattractive trait that conservatives laudably fail to entertain. The right’s frustration with the current state of affairs cannot be satisfied by attempting to change the rules of the game. To convene a Convention of States is to open a Pandora’s Box.
And you, young apprentice, are caught between the Scylla and Charybdis.
It’s time for some bold, Tea Party-driven Heimlich action to dislodge the Progressive projectile currently choking our politics. Lead, follow, or get the focaccia out of the way, Noah.
I don’t think a Constitutional Convention would end the way we want it to. We’d be stripped of every right that matters and given the rights of gay marriage, the right of community property, and the right to regulate business for the good of all mankind. We white males may also end up paying a tax for our raping of the universe.
The Constitution itself is the problem. The only solution would be a return to the Articles of Confederation. That would eliminate the federal government and free the States to do and be whatever they want. Some, maybe most, would sink into despotism, but a few might survive as republics.
I’ve heard that the Constitution, in spite of the claims of its lofty goal of guaranteeing liberty and justice for everyone, was never intended to actually limit the power of government in any way whatsoever, and that hidden in the fine print was always the justification for totalitarian and authoritarian rule—government is going to do what government has always done… I’ve never believed this, but now, for the first time in my life, I’m really concerned that those who do believe that have gained the upper hand!
[…] Smitty: Lunch with Noah Rothman […]
Timing is everything. We do it now, while the wave of Socialism, Communism and other forms of “take from you, give to me” theft & slavery ideology washes over this country, and we’ll be screwed.
Only if 38 state legislatures ratify it, which is to say, no more than 12 reject it.
Considering that a full majority of states joined the first Obamacare challenge to reach SCOTUS — and have gotten redder since — I find the outcome you fear to be unlikely in the extreme.
If we could not prevent O getting reelected, and he is polling at 50% now, what could go wrong with a plan to rewrite the Constitution now?
One of the roots of near-infinite immigration can be found in the fact that when government can create almost unlimited money out of thin air, officials can fund their Utopian dreams. Single payer health insurance, endless “benefits”, endless rules and the people to enforce them, open borders welcoming future voters too. The hard truth is that when Utopians are in power, nearly infinite fiat money enables nearly infinite government.
And near-infinite government funds near-infinite liberal apparatus like gender theory programs and community activism.
Every day more people are coming to the judgment that a carefully organized effort to repair the constitution via the States’ power to propose and ratify amendments has less risk to our liberty and prosperity than the present trajectory of the federal government and especially the federal bureaucracy.
The first order of business of an Article V Convention must be to limit government’s ability to create and spend near-infinite amounts of money.
Tick Tock http://evilbloggerlady.blogspot.com/2015/04/are-we-heading-for-crash-of-stock-market.html
The problem (as Stacy has pointed out) that chaos almost always leads to strong man dictatorship. So we have that going for us too.
Name an institution the left hasn’t been able infiltrate, dominate or pervert it’s purpose in the last hundred years.
We have to evaluate the present trajectory of government as it tears its chains away in big and little ways.
Is there greater risk in leaving things as they are, or is their greater risk that 3/4 of the States will ratify some greater infringement to our liberties?
Recall that the first and best limit to government is a limit on the amount it has available to spend. That is why the first order of business must be how to stop government from having access to as much money as it wants to create out of thin air and limit it only to the amount of money the voters are willing to remit in taxes.
Noah Rothman at hotair: so much straw, so little time.
Shorter version: it’s risky, so let’s just continue to watch everything burn till we have a nice, clean anarchy or maybe a good, rousing civil war. No risk there.
He asks questions that have already been answered so many times you’d think he’d have maybe looked into it at least once before haring off on another exploration and reporting as though he’s the only one who’s done the research.
The fact is, many conventions have been held. The very structure of the process makes it incredibly difficult (as in “far more difficult than the difficulty of getting to the convention itself”) that any group suddenly emerges to cause the delegations to abandon their mandates and begin acting like the European Commission.
Isn’t it interesting how critics can see the enormous difficulties facing honorable men in both a)managing to hold a convention and then b)producing the hoped-for results, while they simultaneously fail to see how those who would attempt to hijack the process would have any difficulties at all?
It’s also interesting that, having supposedly “looked into it” these critics somehow believe that
And exactly how do such groups “demand and receive” a seat at a table that belongs solely top the legislators of the several states? Is it the same mechanism that allows anyone to walk into the well of the Senate and demand to speak and vote? Because that bizarre fantasy is what these kinds of assertions are presenting as “fact.”
That anyone pretending to have studied this matter still believes that Congress has the power “to establish who can attend the convention to finalize the wording of a single amendment” is a sad reflection on the due diligence of their supposed research.
Congress has no such power. The only question before congress is: are the several applications of similar enough nature to be counted as applying for “a Convention for Proposing Amendments,” as the Constitution names it? Congress may not, and cannot decide the parameters of such a convention, nor who may attend. This is the province of the states alone.
This snake oil of an idea that a Convention of the States would be “to open Pandora’s Box” is an appeal to fear in a time when oppression has gained the upper hand, and ALL of the remedies available under the law carry huge burdens of risk. But the choice of doing nothing has already shown itself to be “the right’s worst idea.”
Apparently order has the same effect.
Doesn’t matter. That’s not what the proponents of the CoS are proposing, it’s not what the Constitution allows, and no one could force such a plan on the several States.
It’s not possible to hold a “Constitutional Convention” under the provisions of the Constitution. People claiming that’s what the Convention of States is about are selling a false narrative that has nothing to do with the law or the Constitution.
That’s a bit of a red herring. Having a bad cop on the police force doesn’t automatically make the entire force just as bad.
And by the same token, that’s not a single-edged sword by any means. See Project Veritas, for example.
People on the right may wish to avoid playing the dirty style of game that the left always plays, but that doesn’t mean the left is the only player.
it can get worse…way worse
Here is a less riskier option: 1) Elect conservatives to every branch of government, 2) reform the GOP to be an actual conservative party and 3) then think about a constitutional convention. If we can’t do the first two, how in the hell can we do the third?
I disagree with the idea that Justice Ruth Baader-Meinhoff is merely “…fetishizing the new and the foreign.” her attitude speaks to an elitist outlook that reflects contempt for the average citizen who should be treated herd animals — and culled when appropriate. Take for example her July 2009 NY Times interview where she commented on Roe v. Wade saying “Frankly I had thought that at the time Roe was decided, there was concern about population growth and particularly growth in populations that we don’t want to have too many of” — gee Judge, what people were you and your legal colleagues thinking about that you “don’t want to have too many of”? Compare her comment to 1992 when Ross Perot speaking to a crowd that had some black people when he used the phrase “you people” and was dubbed a RAAAAACIST, funny how that works isn’t it?
No one can hold a Constitutional Convention. It’s not possible unless one has abrogated the law and is off doing something that would still face one small challenge: trying to enforce it.
Electing conservatives has done nothing to end the problems of a runaway Congress. Congress has shown a complete inability to hold itself in check, and THAT is why the Founders insisted on a means for the several states to act as a check against runaway government.
The current Constitution would never have been ratified without the Convention for Proposing Amendments clause in Article V.
That’s her, all right. Exposing the true nature of the left.
The main reason the left demands so much control is exactly that: they don’t want “certain populations” to have the power to defend themselves, or to pursue their unalienable rights.
In other words, they want guns kept out of the hands of blacks and latinos, and they want an incredibly high abortion rate in those same groups.
I have no confidence that ”the right” is up to the challenge of ”playing to win”. There are far too many ”better than they are” as opposed to ”better at it than they are” people on the right.
The problem is not in electing conservatives…the problem is we have elected very few good conservatives.
However, because of the behavior of candidates, that point devolves to a distinction without a difference.
Kelly Ayotte and Jeff Flake are cautionary tales. They played up the “solid” conservative credentials and principles, and after winning their seats, turned their backs on the constituents and began playing the same, old power politics that infects Washington.
Immediately after electing Reagan, the anti-conservative Republicans began working to undo his successes as a conservative leader. The ground never stays fixed (which is exactly what the Rothman article claims will prevent the success of a Convention of States), but it stays slightly “more” fixed in terms of Applications by Legislatures, because it takes an act of the Legislature in a state to rescind an Application. That’s a far more daunting task than simply turning on one’s constituents.
Well, you go to war with the army you have.
And by the way, few legislatures have ever managed to rescind an Application for a Convention of States. It’s possibly harder to get that to happen than it is to get the Application passed in the first place.
Repeal is always the tougher challenge. All one need do to understand that is to look where we are today.
We’re already screwed six ways from Sunday. You don’t need this remedy when everything’s fine. You need it exactly when everything is not fine.
Your nightmare scenario is a possibility, but it is only one possible outcome in a large range of outcomes. At least if that happens, we will know where we stand instead of going through the current war of attrition.
The only bad outcome that I can see from a convention of the states or even a full constitutional convention is if it only tinkers in the margins and we continue down the path we’re on at a slightly different pace.
I suspect that’s the problem, we keep fighting the war on their ground but yet keep fighting it ”our way”.
If they can’t even repeal Obamacare, with the huge wins and the amount of pressure conservatives put on them, trust me. The politicians are not on our side.
My main concern for getting behind a convention of states is that I’m not sure we can cobble together a collection of learned, wise people like we had at the founding.
Still, I think things are getting so bad that there may be less and less downside risk.
However, even if it’s a good idea I don’t think political inertia will allow it. Not without a crisis.
It’s obvious that the left is filled 99% with moral retards, fascists and fools. Slightly less obvious is that 50% of our side are free riders as well. I don’t think there will be enough support for wholesale change until these 3/4ths of the American population are hurting.
You’ve never read Article V of the Constitution?
Noah Rothman: “That divinely inspired document, …”
RSMcC: “Perhaps I’m putting too fine a point on it, but I wouldn’t go further than “divinely informed”, and even that’s a stretch.
Indeed.
RSMcC: “The Constitution is a secular product. Full stop.
No, this is wrong: this is the Foundational Big Lie that “progressives” of various stripes have been shouting for at least the past century.
The US Constitution is *not* secular — it assumes Christianity, and broadly Protestant Christianity, at that. Rather, the US Constitution is non-sectarian; while is assumes Christianity, it doesn’t presume to judge which *sect* of Christianity is more worthy that the others.
You need to read the one in the Constitution of the United States. Accept no substitutes.
Do you mean the way Wilson planted the IED in the form of Amendments 16 & 17, plus the Federal Reserve Act back in 1913?
No, I don’t mean that, because that never happened. The President has no formal role in the Amendment process, both were proposed by Congress to the states before Wilson ever took office, one was ratified some weeks before Wilson was sworn in, and one was ratified a few weeks after.
—
You all might consider making use of the Amendment process to correct actual architectural defects in the government and not to impose policies you’d prefer (re taxes) or to provide an occasion for magical thinking (common with reference to the 17th Amendment) or historical fantasia (a new cottage industry with regard to the 16th Amendment).
—
plus the Federal Reserve Act back in 1913?
Sir Alan Walters, chief macroeconomic adviser to Margaret Thatcher, had a concise description for latter advocates of the gold standard: “crackers”. The experience of the early Depression years should have cured people of an affection for gold, but some people don’t learn.
—
It’s a Smitty article, by the way.
But no, I agree with Smitty. It’s a secular instrument in that it’s made by mankind, for the use in this life by mankind. And it was done in the full knowledge of the statement by Jesus regarding rendering unto Caesar, etc.
In other words, as far as Jesus and the scriptures are concerned, how we govern ourselves and how we manage our institutions is *our* problem. (Of course, that means it’s up to us not to run afoul of the Ten Commandments, for instance, while doing so.)
However that does not preclude divine inspiration while crafting those institutions.
Our Constitution is most certainly the product of centuries of brilliant theological/philosophical writings by notable, Christian men such as John Locke. So if anyone wanted to make the case that it isn’t somehow “divinely inspired” they would be relegated to proving God does not exist.
The Constitution, being secular, has provided a haven for Jews, Zoarastrians, Baha’i, Mormons, Buddhists, atheists, Jainists, and Native American tribal religions, to name only a few. If it were not carefully made secular ON PURPOSE by the Founders (who were not at all new to the debate of such things), then I doubt it would have served so many cultures and faiths for so long. (Up until the left and their friends among the jihadists side of Islam decided to try and destroy it.)
Congress is one thing, and states are another. If you don’t understand that, your opinion isn’t worth squat.
Texas.
Is that what they told you?
“…raping of the universe.”
And hear I am thinking that we were just raping the planet.
Is there some extraterrestrial rape frat that I wasn’t asked to join?
Immediately after electing Reagan, the anti-conservative Republicans
began working to undo his successes as a conservative leader.
No. With the exception of Charles Mathias and James Jeffords, they were passably co-operative for about two years. That included not only the political temporizers who were the modal Republican type ca. 1957 (think Olympia Snowe, or Pres. Eisenhower), it included liberal Republicans like Mark Hatfield and Millicent Fenwick.
And, oh Guru, should we have learned about gold in the early depression years? Why should I think anything of the words of a hubristic adviser to Thatcher?
Both are correct. It is not unreasonable to think that a secular document assumes Christianity. One would end up with huge question mark over their head given John Adam’s statement about the constitution being workable only for a moral and religious people otherwise.
It should be pointed out that in the founders time Presbyterianism and Methodism were regarded as different religions, not as we regard them to today, as sects of the same religion. John Adam’s held Unitarianism, which was actually a different religion, but its mores were pretty much the same as Christianity.
I doubt we have much to lose, frankly. The founding consensus was destroyed long before I was born, and the country has run on inertia. I can’t remember where I read about it, but the Harvard Law Professor that said Constitutional Law ended right after the new Deal was correct.
“Passably cooperative” does not exclude the fact that others did work to keep Reagan from succeeding. Some tried hard, but found they would get slapped back into the background if they didn’t.
Order and prosperity has a tendency towards apathy. Get start thinking that it will always be that way, and so they turn their backs and go back to what they consider normal lives. Alas, they forget about the adage on “eternal vigilance.”
Yeah. But you wouldn’t want to join. Those aliens wiminz is really ugly. Almost as ugly as 3rd wave feministas.
I think arguing that a Convention called by the states is not a constitutional convention is an attempt to make a difference where it does not exist. The only convention that was called was called to propose amendments to the Articles of Confederation. It produced the constitution of 1787, which was proposed as an amendment to the Articles.
Article 5 – Amendment
The Congress, whenever two thirds of both Houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose Amendments to this Constitution, or, on the Application of the Legislatures of two thirds of the several States, shall call a Convention for proposing Amendments, which, in either Case, shall be valid to all Intents and Purposes, as part of this Constitution, when ratified by the Legislatures of three fourths of the several States, or by Conventions in three fourths thereof, as the one or the other Mode of Ratification may be proposed by the Congress; Provided that no Amendment which may be made prior to the Year One thousand eight hundred and eight shall in any Manner affect the first and fourth Clauses in the Ninth Section of the first Article; and that no State, without its Consent, shall be deprived of its equal Suffrage in the Senate.
Distrust of politicians at all levels is never misplaced.
You know when we get there that’s what we’ll do.