June 18, 2017

Billionaire backed effort for constitutional convention

Alternet - A billionaire-backed “movement” is dangerously close to calling a constitutional convention of states under Article V of the U.S. Constitution. If realized, it would be the first constitutional convention since the 1787 Philadelphia Convention, which replaced the Articles of Confederation with the U.S. Constitution.

After an active start to 2017, proponents are now allegedly seven states away from reaching the needed 34 states (two-thirds) to convene a convention. According to Article V, which lays out all the ways the constitution can be amended, any amendments proposed by the convention would then need to be ratified by 38 (three-fourths) of the states.

Analysis of email blasts from proponents and a new op-ed shows that an emboldened group of paid pro-convention campaigners are advocating for a convention to go far beyond its professed purpose of passing a Balanced Budget Amendment. Their proposals include the creation of a national identification card.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

They
re playing it from both sides of the political spectrum, as well. The spamming on various conversation threads is significant. Bear in mind, Republicans now have total control of 32 state governments, that's just two states shy of the required two thirds necessary for the deed. Of course, this is really a play to undo the federal constitution and restructure the US as a confederacy---appears that in the end, the South may have finally won their war.

Anonymous said...

They are getting bad legal advice, as did the proto-Confederacy. Billionaires could not have a better situation as currently where we have essentially no constitution and their own hand picked justices are making it up as they go along in cases teed up by oligarchical lawyers. The last thing they should want is to call attention to a Constitution written down on paper, as if we were a nation of laws. Someone might read the first amendment and notice that it doesn't say money talks. That was Powell's amendment with no basis in law, and which created the current oligarchy. However, de facto the National Security Act ended the republic and a new constitutional convention happens whenever the S.Ct. meets. Our system of government is similar to a theocracy because the judiciary is the supreme branch. Those who seek a convention are inside that paradigm and think that the government is run by courts, and a new document will help the Supremes run our country better, the Court as the sovereign. But when we used to have a republic under FDR and LBJ, constitutional democracy was run by the elected branches in what Prof. Ackerman describes as constitutional level legislation. The demise of Congress was noticed when the Court lopped off enforcement of the 15th Amendment without any authority, and Congress didn't even respond to the usurpation. Similarly whole sections of Article One are under Court control. Jefferson predicted this after Marbury that the Court had nowhere to go to expand its power but to seize it from the elected branches. Similarly the proto-Confederates led by Taney had the branches of gvt sewed up and it was excess of restraint that blew their oligarchical dominance, albeit for only an interruption of about 12 years. Except for the subsequent pushback from muckraking Progressives and FDR through JFK through Carter New Dealers, the oligarchy has dominated over what might be called the Adams constitutionalist faction.