Should we pursue a: Keep it Under 4543 words (The Constitution) Amendment?

[Gumba of Liberty]

The ridiculousness of the corruption in Washington is obvious. These grease monkeys are jamming as many unconstitutional expenditures and regulations in their legislation as possible, the healthcare bill was a monstrosity. To combat this type of abuse, what if we had a Constitutional Amendment introduced that states no bill introduced by Congress can have more words than the Constitution of the United States. In my opinion this is a much more worthy amendment than a balancing the budget considering our debt is denominated in worthless paper. Remember, we owe China a billion piece of worthless paper, its not as if we owe that real assets that we will have to pay back through production. The real problem we have in our system, besides our monetary system, is knowing the contents of congressional bills. The elites know they must prevent us from reading the legislation. That is why the bills are written in secret and that is why the politicians receive them hours before the vote. We need, more than anything, short, concise bills introduced into Congress. I think this is a good step and one that would bring transparency to Washington for the simple fact that even if we don't read the bill, we could ask for the word count to make sure its under the legal limit. Think about the corner most politicians would be put in and how fast and easy it would be to call bullshit. Now the best way to get a bill passed is to have a good name. What would you call this thing?

I got: The Read, Write, and Think About the Bills Amendment or The One Issue at a Time Amendment

[jkr]

sure!

[reillym]

Stupid. The length of a bill has nothing to do with it's ability to do good or bad.

[FrankRep]

No.

[Grubb556]

The constitution is fine, it is just that the Supreme Court needs to start cracking down on all the unconstitutional legislation.

[acptulsa]

Stupid. The length of a bill has nothing to do with it's ability to do good or bad.

Has quite a lot to do with its ability to contain loopholes, however.

All I know is when Washington passes a budget that fits that description, we have so completely won this struggle.

[Dr.3D]

I'm more against attaching bad bills to good ones so the bad ones gets passed.

[acptulsa]

I'm more against attaching bad bills to good ones so the bad ones gets passed.

This. I'm much more likely to jump on a no-riders amendment. Judge every initiative on its own merits.

[QueenB4Liberty]

This. I'm much more likely to jump on a no-riders amendment. Judge every initiative on its own merits.

Me too.

[Gumba of Liberty]

Stupid. The length of a bill has nothing to do with it's ability to do good or bad.

But you must admit that a short length would enable people to read the bills which allows them to, even retroactively, interrogate their elected officials. It would remove the excuse heard from elected officials that they did not have time to read the bills. The bills would be limited in nature, and the special interest would not be able to add superfluousness regulations and appropriations, lest they be so daring to reveal themselves to the American people. I agree that the size of the bill does not make it good or bad. The reason that this amendment is a good step forward is that being concise, in any contract, increases clarity for all parties and keeps all parties honest.

[acptulsa]

But you must admit that a short length would enable people to read the bills which allows them to, even retroactively, interrogate their elected officials.

Neither body may vote on a bill until every member has had a copy for two months. That would do the same thing.

[Gumba of Liberty]

This. I'm much more likely to jump on a no-riders amendment. Judge every initiative on its own merits.

I used to be in complete agreement with you on a no-riders amendment but its to the point where corruption is too rampant even for that. I would love to judge every initiative on its own merits, but what is an initiative? It would not surprise me if these spineless con-artists just changed their definition of initiative and went on their merry way. We have all read the Constitution, their has been no Constitutional Amendment that allows the President to go to war but he does it anyway, this is our reality. So in regards to a no-riders amendment, I do not think they would respect the law. We need to bind these clowns down to something as explicit and elementary as: You MAY NOT pass a bill with more than 4,543 words. I do not think that even these Kings of Corruption could double-speak their way out of that but, of course, they would try their very best.

[Gumba of Liberty]

Given two months, I sincerely doubt that any members of Congress, or anyone else or that matter, would read the 2,409 page Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. The problem is still not addressed. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 = 4 Pages, The Constitution = 6 pages, The Declaration of Independence = 1 page... when they start writing them over 10 pages I begin to get skeptical.

[acptulsa]

I understand. it would be hard to set up a bureaucracy with a bill that short. Harder to hide a thousand loopholes. But if someone introduced a bill bigger than War and Peace which repealed the laws that created the ED, DoE and FDA, I wouldn't want anything to stop it.