john de herrera
03-28-2010, 04:25 AM
There's a part in the play Hamlet, where he and his pal Horatio are in a graveyard talking. And they're looking at a grave, and they talk about it maybe being for a lawyer, and Hamlet asks, "Aren't laws written on sheep skins?" And Horatio says, "Yeah, and calf skins too." And Hamlet replies, "People are nothing but farm animals if they think a law can protect them without action to back it up."
Laws are created to prevent harm. The latest and greatest law of human civilization is the U.S. Constitution. It was written by those who knew back then, what we know now--that governments can become corrupt, that tyranny will result, people will lose their freedom, and become enslaved. In this sense, the Constitution provides our rights, but it's up to us to make sure they remain guaranteed.
Article V of the Constitution has a convention clause. It’s a right of the people to come together, to discuss things politicians won’t. For decades Americans have been frightened away from the convention clause by corporate politicians and corporate media elites, telling us that if we hold a convention it opens up the Constitution, that corporate interests will infiltrate it, we’ll end up with a riddled mess, and everything will be lost. But this is completely untrue, absolutely bogus--a flat-out lie. The Framers of the Constitution did not place a self-destruct button into our high law.
Knowing history, and thus assuming the Congress would become a tyranny of the few, the Framers wrote Article V just so, protecting the Constitution from hostile forces. They were careful to set down three forbidden subjects in it:
1) Altering the arrangement known as slavery (a ban that’s since been lifted both by time and war).
2) Altering the arrangement of equal representation of the states in the Senate.
3) Writing a new constitution.
The Framers were keen to avoid using the term “constitutional convention,” and instead wrote, “...a convention for proposing amendments...as part of this Constitution....”
The Article V Convention is strictly limited to proposing amendments to the Constitution we have, and is forbidden to compose a new one. No matter what amendments are proposed, the structure itself remains intact. The Article V Convention can never become a constitutional convention, cannot write a new constitution, nor can it mandate new law. Whatever idea put forth, it then must garner the approval of 38 states in order to be ratified. To get 38 states out of 50 to agree to an idea is very difficult and for good reason: whatever it is--whether conservative or liberal--you’ll have to get all of one side signed on, plus at least half the other. How’s that for a constitutional principle?
The NRA, John Birch Society, and other conservative groups have always been against a convention, saying that the first thing it would do is take away our weapons. Similarly the ACLU and liberal groups have always been against a convention, saying it would remove freedom of speech. The convention can do no such thing, any delegate who put forth such an idea would be isolated, not to mention that 38 states would never agree to such nonsense.
That said, there are still those who view a convention irrationally and illogically as a bunch of chaos and disorder. First of all, our corporate elites produce chaos and disorder day in and day out with TV and radio. Ben Franklin once said, “Half the truth is often a great lie.” And that’s exactly what our corporate elites feed us--a bunch of half-truths to divide and distract. Secondly where’s the proof a convention today would be chaotic and disorderly? There’ve been hundreds of state conventions over the years, and every last one has put fetters on institutionalized corruption, and/or provided new protections against special interests. And then think about this: If you yourself were a convention delegate (and why shouldn’t you be--you’re here on the internet politically engaged--still caring enough about the fate of your country), do you think you'd start foaming at the mouth, and trying to beat another delegate with your shoe? No, you wouldn't. The gravity of the situation would require calm, rational deliberation. It's the corporate elites who have us thinking we'd go ape at a convention, when really we'd be more rational and civil than they are. They're the ones who would go ape if a convention were called, because it would be the beginning of the end of their monopoly. While some of the negatives of the human condition are greed and corruption, one of the positives is that when people come together consensus happens. It's natural. And as soon as conservatives and liberals come together, they’ll quickly realize, that while they have differences of opinion about subjective matters, we’re all sick and tired of corporate welfare, corporate greed, and the radical double-standard in our lives today between those who take and those who give.
If We The People coerced the convention call out of Congress, it means there would have to be special elections for Convention Delegates. There’d be no need for a campaign war chest, it would not be a two party mud-sling-athon, and anyone who took campaign contributions from corporate interests would be suspect. Convention Delegates would not be running on time-worn themes, like “It’s time for change in Washington,” they’d be championing ideas on how to limit the power of an out-of-control government, and/or how to give We The People a stronger voice. Why is that so? Because the Article V Convention is about the Constitution, not legislation, not pork, perks, personal power, and politics as usual. Delegates will have to take a stand on what they think a new amendment ought to look like, and be able to defend that position. They won't be able to have a forked tongue. They’ll have to be people of integrity, respected in their communities, and once there, they won’t have to worry about who to shake hands with for another campaign.
Upon convening, Delegates would get down to business, and amendment proposals would go through deliberation and debate, the same as any proposed in Congress. After a week or two, proposals of broad support would emerge, they’d be sent to Congress to be forwarded to the states, and the convention would adjourn. Delegates would go back to private citizenship, and the ratification process would begin. Do you think members of Congress, and all other elites want this process to take place? To have the whole nation engaged in how to reverse the trends most of us see as fatal?
In terms of political science, all revolutions, and movements for truth and justice the world over, have always come down to one thing: a tipping-point. Once enough people recognize what needs to be done, the game is over for those who would seek to prevent it.
You want government as master of your life, or do you want taxation with representation? This is not only how to do it, it’s the only way to do it. When a fox gets in a hen house there’s an inevitable conclusion. The elites and corporate interests are not done with us, and liberty is dead if we stay here much longer.
There’s a phrase we all remember from History class in grade school: "The British are coming." Well, this time it's not the British, it's a big freedom-eating machine known as a corporation. It's here, and its power is growing towards an inevitable conclusion.
The U.S. Congress, funded by corporate interests, the Federal Reserve, the Tri-Lateral Commission, the Bilderberg group, nor the World Trade Organization are figments of our imagination. And all the individuals within these organizations--whether they’re conscious of it or not--are going to turn this entire globe into one big jail cell, for you and I to work just enough to remain alive as slaves. Things don't just happen willy-nilly out there in the world, each day we're being moved towards a place where we'll finally be caught and locked down.
How do we expect Congress to issue the call for the Article V Convention? It won't, and never will, unless and until enough Americans start calling for it. All we need is a tipping-point, somewhere between 20-30 million Americans with it firmly in mind, and advocating for it. If you put "Article V Convention" into a Google Alert, you'll see it's on the rise, Americans are thinking of it. Still, many more are afraid of it, so we’re either going to rally enough of us to demand this right, or we’ll all hang together. Not in a bang, but as a poet once said, "The universe will end in a whimper." That's how, in a whimper. And it'll happen within our lifetime--unless we do something about it. If those who died in the American Revolutionary War came back here today, they'd look at some of you, backhand the pacifier out of your mouth, and pop you in the head with the butt of their musket. They'd say, "What the are doing? Get out there and start talking convention." Send letters, call into radio shows, and inform others of this right.
What's our best hope once the convention is called? The amendment we need right now more than anything is one that secures the electoral process from private/corporate interests so the will of the people is transparent, loud, and accurately expressed. Why have a dozen different kinds of private voting machines? Why not the official U.S. Voting Unit, built to specification, paper trail, and all? Right now we have Faith-Based voting--we have to trust a private corporation isn't engineering results.
If you have fifty people in a room, and everyone is relying on each other to get their data straight--you wouldn't say, "Hey Joe from Idaho, go register voters and count your votes how you think best. Mary from Alabama, you do it how you want...." No. We’d say, OK this is how we’re all registering voters, and this is how we're all tallying votes. By creating uniform standards we reduce the points of failure and increase accuracy. We have federal standards for food and drugs, why not The Vote? That’s our voice, indeed that’s the foundation of our freedom, because if you don’t have transparent elections, you don’t have a free society. The two are one and the same thing. When all is said and done, such a non-partisan amendment is the only thing that could possibly be ratified today with everyone so freaked out about everything else.
We’re all taught that the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution are our two most important founding documents. What we’re not taught is that the former was written into the latter--the Article V Convention. The genius of the Constitution is that it provides for a peaceable reformation. It’s convention or bust. We either use it or lose it, and become farm animals awaiting slaughter.
Further reading:
The Last Prerogative
http://www.article-5.org/file.php/1/Articles/the_last_prerogative.pdf
Or this one:
Return To Philadelphia
http://www.article-5.org/file.php/1/Articles/return_to_philadelphia.pdf
Database of state applications for the Article V Convention:
http://foavc.org/file.php/1/Amendments
Marbury v. Madison, 5 U.S. 137 (1803): "It cannot be presumed that any clause in the constitution is intended to be without effect."
The convention clause of Article V is not without effect.
Martin v. Hunter’s Lessee, 14 U.S. 304 (1816): "The government of the United States can claim no powers which are not granted to it by the Constitution."
No branch of government has the power to question the validity of a state application for the Article V Convention.
Prigg v. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, 41 U.S. 539 (1842): "[The] Court may not construe the Constitution so as to defeat its obvious ends when another construction, equally accordant with the words and sense thereof, will enforce and protect them."
To question the validity of a state's application attempts to construe and defeat the obvious ends of the convention clause.
Dodge v. Woolsey, 59 U.S. 331 (1855): "The departments of the government are legislative, executive and judicial. They are coordinate in degree to the extent of the powers delegated to each of them. Each, in the exercise of its powers, is independent of the other, but all, right-fully done by either, is binding upon the others. The constitution is supreme over all of them, because the people who ratified it have made it so; consequently, any thing which may be done unauthorized by it is unlawful."
The three branches of government are unauthorized to question the validity of a state application because the power to do so does not exist. In fact, according to Federalist 85, the saving grace of the Constitution is the prohibition of such a power. The validity/effect of each state application is based solely on its having been cast.
Jarrolt v. Moberly, 103 U.S. 580 (1880): "A constitutional provision should not be construed so as to defeat its evident purpose, but rather so as to give it effective operation and suppress the mischief at which it was aimed."
To attempt to question the validity of a state application, either through its contemporaneousness or subject matter, is to attempt to defeat its purpose and allow the mischief at which it’s aimed to suppress.
U.S. v Sprague, 282 U.S. 716 (1931): "Where intention of words and phrases used in Constitution is clear, there is no room for construction [re-interpretation] and no excuse for interpolation."
Any attempt at construction or interpolation as to the validity of state applications runs counter to the intention of the words used in Article V.
Ullmann v. U.S., 350 U.S. 422 (1956): "Nothing new can be put into the constitution except through the amendatory process, and nothing old can be taken out without the same process."
There's nothing in the Constitution which places any stricture in any way whatsoever on the validity of state applications for a convention. If Anti-Conventionists wish to limit the validity/effect of a state's application, they must propose such an amendment and then work to have that amendment ratified.
Ullmann v. U.S., 350 U.S. 422 (1956): "As no constitutional guarantee enjoys preference, so none should suffer subordination or deletion."
The constitutional guarantee to a national convention is currently suffering subordination. Based on the rule of law the Article V Convention is mandated, which means every Congress is in violation of the U.S. Constitution until the Article V Convention is convoked.
Laws are created to prevent harm. The latest and greatest law of human civilization is the U.S. Constitution. It was written by those who knew back then, what we know now--that governments can become corrupt, that tyranny will result, people will lose their freedom, and become enslaved. In this sense, the Constitution provides our rights, but it's up to us to make sure they remain guaranteed.
Article V of the Constitution has a convention clause. It’s a right of the people to come together, to discuss things politicians won’t. For decades Americans have been frightened away from the convention clause by corporate politicians and corporate media elites, telling us that if we hold a convention it opens up the Constitution, that corporate interests will infiltrate it, we’ll end up with a riddled mess, and everything will be lost. But this is completely untrue, absolutely bogus--a flat-out lie. The Framers of the Constitution did not place a self-destruct button into our high law.
Knowing history, and thus assuming the Congress would become a tyranny of the few, the Framers wrote Article V just so, protecting the Constitution from hostile forces. They were careful to set down three forbidden subjects in it:
1) Altering the arrangement known as slavery (a ban that’s since been lifted both by time and war).
2) Altering the arrangement of equal representation of the states in the Senate.
3) Writing a new constitution.
The Framers were keen to avoid using the term “constitutional convention,” and instead wrote, “...a convention for proposing amendments...as part of this Constitution....”
The Article V Convention is strictly limited to proposing amendments to the Constitution we have, and is forbidden to compose a new one. No matter what amendments are proposed, the structure itself remains intact. The Article V Convention can never become a constitutional convention, cannot write a new constitution, nor can it mandate new law. Whatever idea put forth, it then must garner the approval of 38 states in order to be ratified. To get 38 states out of 50 to agree to an idea is very difficult and for good reason: whatever it is--whether conservative or liberal--you’ll have to get all of one side signed on, plus at least half the other. How’s that for a constitutional principle?
The NRA, John Birch Society, and other conservative groups have always been against a convention, saying that the first thing it would do is take away our weapons. Similarly the ACLU and liberal groups have always been against a convention, saying it would remove freedom of speech. The convention can do no such thing, any delegate who put forth such an idea would be isolated, not to mention that 38 states would never agree to such nonsense.
That said, there are still those who view a convention irrationally and illogically as a bunch of chaos and disorder. First of all, our corporate elites produce chaos and disorder day in and day out with TV and radio. Ben Franklin once said, “Half the truth is often a great lie.” And that’s exactly what our corporate elites feed us--a bunch of half-truths to divide and distract. Secondly where’s the proof a convention today would be chaotic and disorderly? There’ve been hundreds of state conventions over the years, and every last one has put fetters on institutionalized corruption, and/or provided new protections against special interests. And then think about this: If you yourself were a convention delegate (and why shouldn’t you be--you’re here on the internet politically engaged--still caring enough about the fate of your country), do you think you'd start foaming at the mouth, and trying to beat another delegate with your shoe? No, you wouldn't. The gravity of the situation would require calm, rational deliberation. It's the corporate elites who have us thinking we'd go ape at a convention, when really we'd be more rational and civil than they are. They're the ones who would go ape if a convention were called, because it would be the beginning of the end of their monopoly. While some of the negatives of the human condition are greed and corruption, one of the positives is that when people come together consensus happens. It's natural. And as soon as conservatives and liberals come together, they’ll quickly realize, that while they have differences of opinion about subjective matters, we’re all sick and tired of corporate welfare, corporate greed, and the radical double-standard in our lives today between those who take and those who give.
If We The People coerced the convention call out of Congress, it means there would have to be special elections for Convention Delegates. There’d be no need for a campaign war chest, it would not be a two party mud-sling-athon, and anyone who took campaign contributions from corporate interests would be suspect. Convention Delegates would not be running on time-worn themes, like “It’s time for change in Washington,” they’d be championing ideas on how to limit the power of an out-of-control government, and/or how to give We The People a stronger voice. Why is that so? Because the Article V Convention is about the Constitution, not legislation, not pork, perks, personal power, and politics as usual. Delegates will have to take a stand on what they think a new amendment ought to look like, and be able to defend that position. They won't be able to have a forked tongue. They’ll have to be people of integrity, respected in their communities, and once there, they won’t have to worry about who to shake hands with for another campaign.
Upon convening, Delegates would get down to business, and amendment proposals would go through deliberation and debate, the same as any proposed in Congress. After a week or two, proposals of broad support would emerge, they’d be sent to Congress to be forwarded to the states, and the convention would adjourn. Delegates would go back to private citizenship, and the ratification process would begin. Do you think members of Congress, and all other elites want this process to take place? To have the whole nation engaged in how to reverse the trends most of us see as fatal?
In terms of political science, all revolutions, and movements for truth and justice the world over, have always come down to one thing: a tipping-point. Once enough people recognize what needs to be done, the game is over for those who would seek to prevent it.
You want government as master of your life, or do you want taxation with representation? This is not only how to do it, it’s the only way to do it. When a fox gets in a hen house there’s an inevitable conclusion. The elites and corporate interests are not done with us, and liberty is dead if we stay here much longer.
There’s a phrase we all remember from History class in grade school: "The British are coming." Well, this time it's not the British, it's a big freedom-eating machine known as a corporation. It's here, and its power is growing towards an inevitable conclusion.
The U.S. Congress, funded by corporate interests, the Federal Reserve, the Tri-Lateral Commission, the Bilderberg group, nor the World Trade Organization are figments of our imagination. And all the individuals within these organizations--whether they’re conscious of it or not--are going to turn this entire globe into one big jail cell, for you and I to work just enough to remain alive as slaves. Things don't just happen willy-nilly out there in the world, each day we're being moved towards a place where we'll finally be caught and locked down.
How do we expect Congress to issue the call for the Article V Convention? It won't, and never will, unless and until enough Americans start calling for it. All we need is a tipping-point, somewhere between 20-30 million Americans with it firmly in mind, and advocating for it. If you put "Article V Convention" into a Google Alert, you'll see it's on the rise, Americans are thinking of it. Still, many more are afraid of it, so we’re either going to rally enough of us to demand this right, or we’ll all hang together. Not in a bang, but as a poet once said, "The universe will end in a whimper." That's how, in a whimper. And it'll happen within our lifetime--unless we do something about it. If those who died in the American Revolutionary War came back here today, they'd look at some of you, backhand the pacifier out of your mouth, and pop you in the head with the butt of their musket. They'd say, "What the are doing? Get out there and start talking convention." Send letters, call into radio shows, and inform others of this right.
What's our best hope once the convention is called? The amendment we need right now more than anything is one that secures the electoral process from private/corporate interests so the will of the people is transparent, loud, and accurately expressed. Why have a dozen different kinds of private voting machines? Why not the official U.S. Voting Unit, built to specification, paper trail, and all? Right now we have Faith-Based voting--we have to trust a private corporation isn't engineering results.
If you have fifty people in a room, and everyone is relying on each other to get their data straight--you wouldn't say, "Hey Joe from Idaho, go register voters and count your votes how you think best. Mary from Alabama, you do it how you want...." No. We’d say, OK this is how we’re all registering voters, and this is how we're all tallying votes. By creating uniform standards we reduce the points of failure and increase accuracy. We have federal standards for food and drugs, why not The Vote? That’s our voice, indeed that’s the foundation of our freedom, because if you don’t have transparent elections, you don’t have a free society. The two are one and the same thing. When all is said and done, such a non-partisan amendment is the only thing that could possibly be ratified today with everyone so freaked out about everything else.
We’re all taught that the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution are our two most important founding documents. What we’re not taught is that the former was written into the latter--the Article V Convention. The genius of the Constitution is that it provides for a peaceable reformation. It’s convention or bust. We either use it or lose it, and become farm animals awaiting slaughter.
Further reading:
The Last Prerogative
http://www.article-5.org/file.php/1/Articles/the_last_prerogative.pdf
Or this one:
Return To Philadelphia
http://www.article-5.org/file.php/1/Articles/return_to_philadelphia.pdf
Database of state applications for the Article V Convention:
http://foavc.org/file.php/1/Amendments
Marbury v. Madison, 5 U.S. 137 (1803): "It cannot be presumed that any clause in the constitution is intended to be without effect."
The convention clause of Article V is not without effect.
Martin v. Hunter’s Lessee, 14 U.S. 304 (1816): "The government of the United States can claim no powers which are not granted to it by the Constitution."
No branch of government has the power to question the validity of a state application for the Article V Convention.
Prigg v. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, 41 U.S. 539 (1842): "[The] Court may not construe the Constitution so as to defeat its obvious ends when another construction, equally accordant with the words and sense thereof, will enforce and protect them."
To question the validity of a state's application attempts to construe and defeat the obvious ends of the convention clause.
Dodge v. Woolsey, 59 U.S. 331 (1855): "The departments of the government are legislative, executive and judicial. They are coordinate in degree to the extent of the powers delegated to each of them. Each, in the exercise of its powers, is independent of the other, but all, right-fully done by either, is binding upon the others. The constitution is supreme over all of them, because the people who ratified it have made it so; consequently, any thing which may be done unauthorized by it is unlawful."
The three branches of government are unauthorized to question the validity of a state application because the power to do so does not exist. In fact, according to Federalist 85, the saving grace of the Constitution is the prohibition of such a power. The validity/effect of each state application is based solely on its having been cast.
Jarrolt v. Moberly, 103 U.S. 580 (1880): "A constitutional provision should not be construed so as to defeat its evident purpose, but rather so as to give it effective operation and suppress the mischief at which it was aimed."
To attempt to question the validity of a state application, either through its contemporaneousness or subject matter, is to attempt to defeat its purpose and allow the mischief at which it’s aimed to suppress.
U.S. v Sprague, 282 U.S. 716 (1931): "Where intention of words and phrases used in Constitution is clear, there is no room for construction [re-interpretation] and no excuse for interpolation."
Any attempt at construction or interpolation as to the validity of state applications runs counter to the intention of the words used in Article V.
Ullmann v. U.S., 350 U.S. 422 (1956): "Nothing new can be put into the constitution except through the amendatory process, and nothing old can be taken out without the same process."
There's nothing in the Constitution which places any stricture in any way whatsoever on the validity of state applications for a convention. If Anti-Conventionists wish to limit the validity/effect of a state's application, they must propose such an amendment and then work to have that amendment ratified.
Ullmann v. U.S., 350 U.S. 422 (1956): "As no constitutional guarantee enjoys preference, so none should suffer subordination or deletion."
The constitutional guarantee to a national convention is currently suffering subordination. Based on the rule of law the Article V Convention is mandated, which means every Congress is in violation of the U.S. Constitution until the Article V Convention is convoked.