By Rich Kozlovich
On August 10, 2024 Allan J. Feifer published this piece, The Next Conflict saying:
The United States has been at a financial, social, and leadership crossroads for at least the last twenty years. Whatever approaches we've used in the past to fix our country have failed. Mistakes we've made are cumulative; in a sense, we are paying perpetual interest for those blunders that compound daily.
While I think that's an excellent observation, he then bounced around a lot, and I think foolishly, to get the idea we can only fix all the stuff he belabors readers with an Article Five Convention of States. And in spite of the fact he recognizes:
We aren't the same people we were 50 years ago, much less 250 years ago. It isn't even arguable anymore that personal freedom is no longer the most important of the freedoms for many.
And yet he still thinks surviving and getting by is the highest aspiration many have. The propensity to exchange liberty for trinkets is manifestly accepted today. If put to a popular vote, free things would win over individual freedom every time. Yet, we must find a way to have this debate on our future without resorting to mob rule.
We can take one of several avenues while we still have time to make the decisive turn towards sanity and self-reliance that can see our country return to its roots, prosper, and continue. I am a proponent of an Article 5 convention while we still have majority control of the states.
An Article Five Convention would:
Be called by the state legislatures to propose amendments to the Constitution. It is not a constitutional convention. It cannot throw out the Constitution because its authority is derived from it.
Through this mechanism (there may be others), we can reclaim our country from those who would see it end as we know it. To learn more, visit the Convention of States. Our demise is certain if we don't start a national debate that is open, honest, and fair soon—calling all would-be patriots to step up and join the discussion.
A Convention of states sounds so great, but I think it's dangerous beyond belief. Let's first do the least difficult first and pass an amendment that repeals the 16th and 17th Amendments. Easy to understand, easy to explain, easy to justify. If we can't do that, how in the world could we have a positive Constitutional Convention?
Can you imagine what it would be like convening such a group who would then want to try and create an entirely new constitution? Because once such a convention was convened, that's exactly what would happen, a convention filled with potentially hundreds of people with strange ideas. Ideas they would want to impose on America. A big chunk of whom would be historical ignoramuses.
If the nation can't hold a national election devoid of massive voter fraud now, how can we rationally expect to send uncorrupted delegates to such a convention? There were 55 delegates who created the Constitution, all of whom shared common social paradigms, and it took months before the "Frame of Government" was adopted by that Constitutional Convention.
Once a Constitutional Convention is constituted it becomes a power unto itself as the absolute representatives of the states.
There's nothing in the Constitution that restricts such a convention once formed, or tells how such a convention would be constituted, how many representatives would be there from each state, who or how the delegates would be appointed, and no one outside of the convention delegates could instruct them as to what they can do, how they should do it, or what they can address.
I think we're long past such an event if the goal is to see a return to traditional Constitutional understanding or values. Let's start with repealing the 16th and 17th Amendments, then a balanced budget, then term limits of federal judges, then term limits for all federal elected officials, and do each one at a time.
If any one of those efforts are too difficult to accomplish, how could an article five convention be less difficult?