Opening a Constitutional Convention is a very “Big Thing.”
Thomas Jefferson said: ”I am not an advocate for frequent changes in laws and constitutions. But laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind. As that becomes more developed, more enlightened, as new discoveries are made, new truths discovered, and manners and opinions change, with the change of circumstances, institutions must advance also to keep pace with the times. We might as well require a man to wear still the coat which fitted him when a boy as civilized society to remain ever under the regimen of their barbarous ancestors.”
Jefferson was right. Amending the Constitution is a serious thing. Article V of the United States Constitution provides that amendments to the Constitution can be proposed in two ways—by Congress or by constitutional convention. After an amendment is proposed by either method, it must be ratified by the State legislatures or State conventions in three-fourths of the States (currently 38) to become a part of our Constitution.
The second method of proposing amendments is triggered upon the applications or petitions of two-thirds of the State legislatures. Under this method, after Congress receives the applications, Article V provides that Congress shall call a constitutional convention to propose constitutional amendments.
As you can clearly see, a very serious process. And one must pick and choose our battles.
What do I mean by this?
When we open a constitutional convention we are setting a precedent: specifically, if we open a CC for flag burning, then why not a CC over rights for pedophiles? The door is opened and I fear for the hordes and masses that will want to walk through.
Would you rather open a CC over flag burning, or over the definition of marriage and/or English as the national language?
Fighting the fight over flag burning impresses me minimally.
I have seen little written on this and suspect I may take some heat over my stance. But in terms of picking one’s fight, I’ll take on the marriage and English issue(s) before I’ll make an issue over flag burning.
Particularly when, per tradition, burning the flag is the approved method of disposing of an old or tattered flag. Shall we possibly open Pandora’s Box over the intent and mental attitude when one burns a flag? Yes, yes, I fully well realize the clear issues of respect vs. lack of respect; but current national law is that burning a flag is a matter of self-expression and free speech. So has the SCOTUS declared in their 1989 and 1990 rulings. I agree with Diane Feinstein when she said that flag burning is an act and not a method of speech — despite the SCOTUS opinions.
WASHINGTON — The Senate yesterday fell a single vote short of approving a constitutional amendment designed to ban flag burning, in the closest vote to date on an issue that Republicans hope will motivate conservative voters to go to the polls this fall.
Sixty-six senators voted in favor — three more than the last time the Senate took up the measure, in 2000, but one short of the two-thirds majority needed for constitutional amendments.
However, in my opinion, creation of an amendment against flag burning minimizes the larger social issues I have addressed above — and opens the door to any number of conehead ideas proffered by the Cultural Changers of our society. There are so many places I do not want us to go under the guise of a constitutional convention.
To me, there are larger and more important issues that likely cannot be addressed in any other fashion than an amendment — such as marriage defined as that union between one man and one woman.
BZ
I agree. This is an issue of taste and respect and I seriously doubt the Constitution should be amended to placate to one’s sense of offense. If flag burning is an act worthy of banning because of its symbolism, then shouldn’t desecrating the image of the President? After all, if an argument is made that men and when died protecting that flag then we can certainly make the argument that men and women died carrying out orders on behalf of the President, who supposedly represent the will of the American people.
I’ve never seen anyone burn a flag. This is election year pandering. But I’m sure one day it will make it to the states and it will pass then the floodgates will open and a host of offensive acts will find their way to the Senate floor
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I am on the same sheet of music with you, James. Yes, it angers me to see my sovereign flag burned. Internationally there is nothing I can do. Domestically, the SCOTUS has declared this act lawful. So be it.
And you are correct: one man’s offensive act is another man’s norm. However, I make this argument perhaps not in the same fashion you think.
In any event, this is a fight I would much rather reserve for an issue more overarching.
BZ
We had the constitution up here opened and re-written in 1967(formerly the BNA act). It’s been a downhill slide ever since. Only just know are people starting to see how downhill it really is due to it’s new open ended wording …. 🙁
I would not endorse a Constitutional Convention for much of anything, save the fact that the current Government is no longer adhering to the current Constitution in which the Federal Government will take to protect all the States in the Union. That was the agreement of 1787 and is codified by giving the Federal Government the capability to have a National Militia with support from the States so that All the States may be protected and no single State to hold the burden of defending itself.
To protect this Union the States were given rights of autonomy within the Union save for those few things that were held in common to All States. In return for those powers, the Federal Government agrees to be held accountable by the States and the People for its activities on their behalf. And by the rights and powers and balancing of same within the Constitution, States have the capability to change many things and to directly go to the Federal Government and tell them: “You shall either protect us or declare the Constitution to be ended”. Of course there are many things that can be done via responsible means short of that. But, if I were a governor or part of the Peoples in States no longer afforded protection and Sovereignty as People within an autonomous State within the Union, I would press heavily for that accountability all the way to that major question on why the Federal Government has reneged on its agreement held since 1787.
This Government no longer protects National Sovereignty nor the Sovereignty of its States, does not use the diplomatic means at its disposal to hold other Nations accountable for their actions, encourages the diminishment of the common welfare by not enforcing the Laws of the Land and, in that doing, no longer provide equal Justice to All of the People.
For flags and marriage, that is a matter for States. For protecting the Union… either do so or declare the Government incapable and withdraw support from it and open a new State’s Convention for a new Constitution. Apply all other pressure FIRST, but if those cannot be done properly and the Government remains unaccountable to its role as Sovereign Protector of the Union as a whole, then it must be ended.
The Constitution is *only* a guarantee if it is looked at and used as such. When responsibilities are abdicated and the Union used to mere partisan or ideological goals, then it is subverted in whole in that doing as those do not account for all of the People. The Federal Government was formed to *govern* not *rule* nor *reign*. And its first duty, above all, is to protect the Union.
After we are the People of the United States we are then a UNION, even before Justice and the common defense. That is the priority we are given and agreed to since 1787. I adhere to that as all Citizen *must*: it is Our Duty to do so. And that comes before any mention of *rights* in the Constitution, so it takes precedence as a responsibility and those rights must be *used* to uphold that responsibility.
Or the Union, as we know it, ends.
After having read your comment, AJ, and that of AB Freedom’s in Canada, I am now of the bent that perhaps things are best well left alone and pristine.
Not that I believe a flag desecration amendment will be extant in any event; I believe that to be just what some are saying: an attempt to rally the GOP.
And, quite frankly, it’s the wrong issue to rally around. First securing and then totally closing the borders? If the GOP had actual eyes and ears, it would ramp THAT issue up to Priority Number One.
But they won’t because that would Stir The Pot and Lordy Lordy, we can’t have that — and listen to all those CONSTITUENTS who may BAIL on us just like those nasty CONSERVATIVES did during ARNOLD’S election. Zounds! They would have to MAKE A TOUGH DECISION and actually TAKE A CHANCE.
I’ll believe it when I see it.
Yes indeed. I am convinced. Leave the Constitution right where it is; untouched.
BZ
To turn the Nation requires One, just One Governor to step up to this plate and ask that the State be protected by the entirety of the United States being so protected.
One People with their State may reach a new accord so as to forcefully protect their State and then hand all invaders over as INVADERS and DEMAND protection.
And in either case the warning is: “Protect this Union or a new Convention shall be called by my State so that a Government that CAN protect us shall be formed.”
One fine Shays away from the depths of the pit.
And if the choice is put of destruction of the Union by inaction or the possibility of a ledge we could fall upon on the way down into the abyss… who could say that such a ledge is not a better place from certain loss of Nation?
A Republic could easily withstand these tribulations. It did so in the 19th Century and We the People became stronger for it.
What we have today cannot withstand these problems and so will collapse into ruin, either by piece or whole, but wholly undermined unless the old and stable structure is found within the mass of additions and those additions lost. Try to keep it all and all is lost as the structure pulls firm ground down with it.
Lose much of the shambling structure now and the basis of liberty is saved and can move forward from such loss as it is on firm ground.
Each generation is challenged with the Loss of the Republic. Each has said so in its papers and memoirs and writings, and we scoff at them at our peril. They built hard to ward off such loss, but kept to the main structure… by adding on useless parts on unfirm ground we now find the entirety sinking… and can either watch in horror…
Or remain Citizens and say that much of what has been added on is folly and should be lost so We the People can re-assess what is absolutely *necessary* to have a government that *governs*. In welfare, health care, social security, agriculture, business administration… it has proven worse than useless. A Republic does not *do* these things… unless ‘Socialist’ is in front of it… and the United States was not formed to be that creature that devours heart and soul and lives and gives abject poverty to all.