Topic: Article V Convention
Constitutional Hypocrisy Amazingly, so many Americans express love and respect for the US Constitution, yet so few understand how and why Congress has gotten away with disobeying a piece of it.by Joel S. Hirschhorn
(libertarian)
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
Millions of Americans are politically informed, smart, active and angry. They see many wrongs in our political and government system. They are fed up with politics as usual, meaning corrosive corruption of politicians by corporate and other special interests. They see little good in either the Democrat or Republican parties. And they almost always share a common bond: They love and honor the US Constitution, even though they may see some flaws in it. Yet they are also constitutional hypocrites.
Why do I say this? Because Americans are overwhelmingly ignorant or misinformed about the constitutional paths for amending the Constitution. Too many, in fact, seem to miss the profoundly important point that the Founders and Framers knew that they had not created a perfect document and blueprint for the US. That is why they placed two specific paths for amending the Constitution.
But very few Americans know that only one of these amendment mechanisms has been used in the entire history of the country. All the current amendments were proposed by Congress. This should raise this serious question today: Considering the very low regard for Congress by the overwhelming majority of Americans, which is richly deserved, why should we have any confidence that Congress would ever propose amendments that could kill so much of the corruption that plagues our system, especially corruption of members of Congress?
This situation was somehow anticipated by the Framers. They could see that there was a strong possibility that Americans would eventually lose confidence in the federal government. Which is why they put a second path to amending the Constitution into the document. A path that has never been used. This is the provision in Article V for a convention of state delegates that could propose amendments, which like the proposals from Congress would still have to be ratified by three-quarters of the states.
Being human, the Framers made a mistake. They gave Congress the sole power to call or convene an Article V convention. The single explicit requirement that was supposed to make Congress call a convention was that two-thirds of state legislatures had to request an Article V convention. The Framers did not, apparently, envision a future in which Congress would stubbornly ignore state applications for a convention and get away with it, despite language that demands that Congress "shall" call a convention when one simple requirement is met. How could they envision that Congress would blatantly disobey something so simply stated in the Constitution? How could they anticipate such weak states, unwilling to make Congress respect their constitutional right? The Framers clearly were not cynical enough.
The situation we face today is that all 50 states have submitted over 750 applications for a convention, considerably more than enough to trigger the constitutional mandate that Congress convene an Article V convention. How could Congress get away with this kind of unconstitutional behavior? Apparently, a combination of political corruption and public ignorance has allowed Congress to get away with this. Even among the millions of Americans that proudly declare their loyal allegiance to the Constitution, there is no recognition that unless they demand that Congress obey Article V, they are constitutional hypocrites. Congress has no right to unilaterally decide that it can ignore and disobey a part of the Constitution.
Note that Congress never even created a mechanism where they would collect in a public way the state applications for an Article V convention, which helped create public ignorance of this situation. Add to this that many, many organized vested interests on the left and right like their ability to corrupt Congress to get what they want from it. This is why they have frequently mounted campaigns to make the public fear a convention, because such a convention might actually propose reforms that would remove corruption of Congress by contributing money for campaigns and pursuing lobbying.
Ignorance and fear have combined to thwart public demands that Congress obey the Constitution and convene the first Article V convention. In fact, there is only one national, nonpartisan organization vainly attempting to educate the public so that Congress would be forced to finally give us the first Article V convention. Friends of the Article V Convention at foavc.org is also the only group that has collected state applications for a convention and made them publicly available.
Their efforts may be working. A new online survey asked this: Based on your assessment of American politics, would you support or oppose a call for a Constitutional Convention? Supporters won easily at 65 percent.
It comes down to this, unless you get informed and join the mission to make Congress obey the Constitution, you are a constitutional hypocrite, not what the nation needs.
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The views expressed in this
article are those of Joel S. Hirschhorn only and do not represent
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I agree, but, hasn't anyone filed legal challenges ? I mean, we have a balance of power system, therefore, the Supreme Court as the Judicial Branch could determine if Congress is acting in contravention of the constitution. So, what have been the legal efforts to get the Supreme Court to review it, as it requires a challenge in order to trigger the Supreme Court review.
I have mixed feeling about a Article 5 Convention, afterall the same people that would show up are the same people that vote these tyrants into office. I wouldn't be surprised if anything garnered out of the process would be less freedom overall.
We obviously need some sort of national referendum on issues when the leaders aren't listening to the people.
Back in the bad old days, marriage had little to do with legal definitions and tax positions and was more of a simple lifelong commitment to one's chosen love, forsaking all others in the pursuit of perfection in that personal relationship. Were it not for unwanted (and unnecessary) government interference in our personal relationships, none of the furor over the definition of the word 'marriage' would ever have happened. No taxes, no tax position. No inheritance laws (and taxes), no need to prove familial status. You get the idea. No, we don't need to change the law, we need to get rid of huge chunks of it entirely. Regardless of one's preferences, removing the legal obstacles to happiness should be on all of our lists.
Posted By: Joel S. Hirschhorn
Date: 2009-10-15 06:12:42
To James Luko: I was hoping that my other co-founder of FOAVC Bill Walker would respond to your question. He did bring a lawsuit and eventually the Supreme Court refused to hear the case. There is much information about his case on our website foavc.org.
Sorry for being late to respond but as they say I was unavoidably detained.
To James Luko:
Joel pretty well answered your question. I would only add that the full lawsuit can be read at www.foavc.org at FAQ 9.1. One point he didn't mention was that before the court denied the lawsuit, the government admitted several points. Under federal court rules before the court decides whether to hear a case, the parties are required to state what is correct as to fact and law. The opposition party is then required to state whether or not the facts and law stated are correct. In my case, the following was admitted by the government: (1) a convention call is peremptory (a legal term meaning required with no terms or conditions); (2) a convention call is based on a simple numeric count of applying states with no terms or conditions and (3) by refusing to obey Article V and call a convention and so stating in public the members of Congress were and are in criminal violation of their oaths of office. The law states if they so in violation they cannot "hold or accept" federal office.
To Randy:
I can understand your concern about a convention but I disagree about the voting. Congratulations on realizing however that delegates must be elected. Many people do not understand this and assume Congress or some other such body will appoint everyone to a convention. The courts ruled delegates must be elected many years ago.
The point is, because a convention will be new, because many will realize it will be the last chance to really make changes peacefully, because of its obvious importance and because of the fact that amendments are issues meaning this will strictly be an election on issues (i.e., how does the delegate feel about amendment issue "X" and how will he vote) this should drive nearly everyone in this nation to participate and vote. It will inspire, I feel, a major re-education of the American people making them once again understand what this nation is and what we truely are and what we stand for.
As to your referendum comment, if you read the applications at www.foavc.org, you'll see that in 1929 or so Wisconsin made an application asking for an initiative, referendum, recall amendment. In short, the states beat you to the punch by 100 years.
And if you have any doubts consider what our nation could be like if such an amendment had existed even as early as only three years ago before bailouts and other overreaches by the government. This is only one example of many I could cite where the states have long since tried to change the ways things are today.
Posted By: Richard Backus
Date: 2009-10-16 04:49:50
As far as I know, violation of a critical clause in any contract invalidates the entire contract. Article V is a separate ARTICLE!, not a subordinate clause of another Article, and the only method available to force legislation the Congress itself was unwilling to create but important to the citizenry. The usual mehod of avoiding an invalidation of this sort is to include a statement saying that if any clause is illegal or invalid, the rest is still in effect. I don't remember any such clause in our Constitution. The lawmakers of that period were quite serious about what was important and left no legal way to avoid any of its particulars. Under that legal precept (that is, if anyone is interested in the law), the Constitution is now entirely invalid and Congress has no rights whatsoever.
I would just like to add that many of the states do have an impeachment clause or sometimes it is called a recall , some way to remove their state representative from office in their own constitutions. Don't forget that when the nation was founded the states had all the rights and they used them. We need to all become familar with our own state constitution. I think that the two together (convention and removing people from office) might be the only way we get out of this in a civil manner.
You are so correct about the ignorance. I thank you for taking your citizenship role so seriously and taking action on this issue. Even though I have a copy of the constitution with me for occasional reference and edification, I did not understand Article V and the power it gives us the people of this nation. Thank you so much.
I concur with your writing completely. My hope is that every American reads this and agrees. I feel that an Article V Convention is the only way we are going to be able to take our country back.
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