Constitution

One counterintuitive implication of [Condorcet's] mathematical argument was that the larger the group voting, the more likely it was to arrive at a judicious outcome. From James Miller's book Can Democracy Work ?

Ohio had a question on the fall ballot to change the Constitution to make abortion legal. Republicans decided to have a special election with only one question: whether to revise the Constitution to require 60% majority to make change. With only one question, the GOP expected low turnout and only very active voters. But the election was said to be a ‘blowout’, with people voting the Ohio Constitution will continue to be changed by a simple majority.

The lesson: a Constitution that is hard to change enables minority rule. The US Constitution is almost impossible to change, but just as in Ohio, if it did change by simple majority of the national popular vote, people could regain their voice in government, very unpopular, undemocratic Supreme Court decisions overturned, and the Constitution altered for the modern world, failing that, the US will continue it's slide into fascism, corruption, and dystopia.

The US Constitution, designed for the minority rule of property owners and slave holders, is like a burning building with people locked inside, preventing escape from destruction. Collapse of government and climate is in sight.

To restore people’s voice in government, (aka democracy) there should be considerable change to the US Constitution. It would be best to allow change to the Constitution by a majority of the national popular vote. Adequate change is highly unlikely.

The Constitution was drafted to protect property, which it does, not to be democratic. It is difficult to change and badly needs updating.

The Constitution is not a suicide pact.

A strict observance of the written law is doubtless one of the high duties of a good citizen, but it is not the highest. The laws of necessity, of self-preservation, of saving our country when in danger, are of higher obligation. To lose our country by a scrupulous adherence to the written law, would be to lose the law itself, with life, liberty, property and all those who are enjoying them with us; thus absurdly sacrificing the ends to the means.
Thomas Jefferson

Here is a likely forecast.

Inside Steve Bannon’s ‘disturbing’ quest to radically rewrite the US constitution (10/19/2022)

Every Country Is a Living Organism (5/27/2022)

Thomas Jefferson Gave the Constitution 19 Years. Look Where We Are Now. (8/4/2021)

Trump's presidency has amended the Constitution. Not formally, of course, but informally...which matters just as much. (2/22/2021)

No society can make a perpetual constitution, or even a perpetual law. The earth belongs always to the living generation...Every constitution, them, and every law, naturally expires at the end of 19 years. If it be enforced longer, it is an act of force and not of right." Thomas Jefferson in a letter to James Madison from Paris, September 6, 1789

" ... the federal architecture intended to be a check and balance against tyrants, is not poised to act. Congressional representation is fundamentally anti-democratic. In the Senate, politicians representing 18 percent of the national population—epicenters of Trump’s base—can cast 51 percent of the chamber’s votes. A Republican majority from rural states, representing barely 40 percent of the population, controls the chamber. It repeatedly thwarts legislation reflecting multicultural America’s values—and creates a brick wall for impeachment." 20 Ways Trump Is Copying Hitler’s Early Rhetoric and Policies

This Court has gone far toward accepting the doctrine that civil liberty means the removal of all restraints from these crowds and that all local attempts to maintain order are impairments of the liberty of the citizen. The choice is not between order and liberty. It is between liberty with order and anarchy without either. There is danger that, if the Court does not temper its doctrinaire logic with a little practical wisdom, it will convert the constitutional Bill of Rights into a suicide pact. Justice Jackson's dissent in Terminiello v. City of Chicago

It’s been 50 years* since America’s last real update to its Constitution. We asked seven writers and legal scholars what they think needs amending next. (NYT) 8/4/2021 We The People.

Let's be brutal: democracy is dying. And the most startling thing is how few ordinary people are worried about it. Instead we compartmentalise the problem. Americans worried about the present situation typically worry about Trump - not the pliability of the most fetishised constitution in the world to kleptocratic rule. Paul Mason

“I actually don’t think our Constitution is failing, I think it is doing exactly what it was designed to do from the beginning, which is to protect the interest of a small number of rich white men.”

The Constitution does not mention God. Only that Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion

Why We Need A Constitutional Convention

Center For Constitutional Rights

The Democracy Amendments

American Constitution Society

Constitution.org

The Constitution in Plain English

Constitution Building

American Constitution Society 2020 Convention (videos)

Fund For Constitutional Government

People's Blog For the Constitution

Convention USA

Is US still a Constitutional Government ?

The Secret Government: The Constitution in Crisis Bill Moyers

How to improve decision making. (Daniel Ellsberg)

MoveToAmend.org

. . . with the collapse of the middle class in the last thirty years, we can no longer ignore the constitutional significance of economic inequality. Today, we live in an America in which the middle class is being hollowed out and political power is increasingly in the hands of the wealthiest individuals and corporations. As economic power and political power come into alignment, our system will become less and less amenable to reform. The Crisis Of The Middle-Class Constitution, Why Economic Inequality Threatens Our Republic: Ganesh Sitaraman pg 275

Donald Trump’s Alternate Constitutional Reality (10/9/2020)

The Democracy Amendments

James Mattis Denounces President Trump, Describes Him as a Threat to the Constitution (6/2020) The Atlantic

After a week of The Discourse about the "woke scolds" shutting down speech, we have the most powerful person in the country attemping to censor a book with content he doesn't like and now appearing to threaten protesters planning to exercise their right to free assembly.
— Chris Hayes (@chrislhayes) June 19, 2020

"The Constitution places more barriers to democracy than other developed countries. Four were specified in the slavery-defending founders Constitution: absolute veto power for the Senate, for the House, and for the president (if not outvoted by a two-thirds majority), and a Constitution that cannot be altered without the agreement of two-thirds of the states after Congress. Other features of the U.S. system further obstruct majority rule, including a winner-take-all Electoral College that encourages a two-party system; the Tenth Amendment, which steers power toward the states; and a system of representation in the unusually potent Senate that violates the principle of 'one person, one vote' to a degree not seen anywhere else. Owing to such mechanisms, Stepan and Linz note, even in the late 1960's, the heydey of income equality in the United States, no other country in the set of [long-standing democracies] was as unequal as America, and most were substantially more equal. As arresting, even the most equal U.S. state is less equal than any comparable country." from Democracy in Chains, Nancy McClean

Trump falsely tells auditorium full of teens the Constitution gives him "the right to do whatever I want" https://t.co/X9HXP1m76S
— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) July 23, 2019

...in this effort to eliminate political violence they inspire just what they claim to be combating by suggesting that world peace is gained by the forcible spread of American ideology. Imperialism Destroys the Constitutional Republic

"The Constitution should be clarified so that it sustains rather than throttles democracy. Do away with the Electoral College. Ban the practice of gerrymandering. Close the loophole that allows governors to appoint cronies to vacant Senate seats. Ask why America maintains a House of Lords - like Senate where, today, the vote of a member elected by 121,000 Wyomingites can cancel out the vote of a member elected by 7.8 million Californians. Consider electing members of the House to four-year terms that parallel those of the president, so that the popular will of 131 million voters in the next mid-term election can't be stymied by 90 million voters in the next mid-term election." Robert McChesney and John Nichols book: People Get Ready

'We've come to this ignoble moment.' 'We have become like Serbia.' 12 Jul 2008 'I never thought I would say this, but I think it might, in fact, be time for the United States to be held internationally to a tribunal. I never thought in my lifetime I would say that, that we have become like Serbia, where an international tribunal has to come to force us to apply the rule of law... So we've come to this ignoble moment, where we could be forced into a tribunal and forced to face the rule of law that we've refused to apply to ourselves.' --Constitutional Law expert Jonathan Turley, on MSNBC's Friday 'Countdown,' discussing accountability behind US war crimes at Guantanamo.

The Patriot Act inverts the constitutional requirement that people's lives be private and the work of government officials be public; it instead crafts a set of conditions in which our inner lives become transparent and the workings of the government become opaque. Either one of these outcomes would imperil democracy; together they not only injure the country but also cut off the avenues of repair. Elaine Scarry

Key point in this tweet: “USPS is in the Constitution and funding it not a thing we should have to haggle about.”
Yes, Article I, Section 8, Clause 7.
Hey “constitutional conservatives” & “strict constructionists,” the Constitution very clearly calls for postal service. https://t.co/CWnqGyldWD
— EJ Dionne (@EJDionne) April 25, 2020

Here’s Another Impeachable Offense: Trump’s War on the Constitution (10/8/2019)

The Crisis of Our Constitution (1/2019)

It is likely that the US Constitution can no longer support a republic either if Republicans are successful in overthrow or otherwise retaking government [which looks quite possible] or if the middle class collapses. (See the Crisis of the Middle-Class Constitution, Why Economic Inequality Threatens Our Republic by Ganesh Sitaraman.

Republicans supporting Trump are corroding US institutions, the Constitution, and the republic.

It really comes down to a problem with the Constitution, doesn't it ? It should be one person, one vote. But it's not. States vote for President, not people. Rural votes weight much more heavily, driving politics inexorably to the right. Republicans win without the popular vote. That's why the Senate, SCOTUS, and the President are like they are.

Because the Constitution is hard to change, the Supreme Court bends it favoring the right. SCOTUS has been bending the tiller to the right for a long time, and we are now approaching Fascism.

Right wing politics leads to concentration of the economy, and to wealth inequality which is itself a marker of bad government.”arguments in defense of the centralization of power and rising authoritarianism are always different, but the results are always the same: corruption, stagnation, dictatorship, repression, violence.” Gary Kasparov

Unfettered capitalism favors a strong man head of state, a dictator, not democracy. History shows placing national power in one individual is always a mistake. Europeans made their royalty ceremonial only and they are much safer. Putin, Orban, Bolzanaro, KJU, and Trump are enemies of democracy. Republicans have consolidated power in the President, a very stable genius, who evangelicals has called the chosen one. Trump acknowledges no constraints, which is why he is dangerous. However capitalists favor dictators because they are usually for sale.

If Trump can redirect funds from military projects to the wall, which Mexico will not pay for, Congress opposes, is an environmental disaster, and is unpopular. That breaks the Constitution’s clause that Congress controls spending.

If Trump can refuse Congressional subpoenas for documents, witnesses, that breaks Congressional oversight and impeachment power of the Constitution, as well as checks and balances. If sycophants on the Courts take Trump’s side removing his accountability, that could kill our Republic.

Congress surrendered war power to the President. Richard Nixon in 1974, when he was threatened with impeachment told reporters, “I can go into my office and pick up the telephone, and in 25 minutes 70 million people will be dead.”

Partisan polarization means that impeachment can not hold the President accountable.

Trump is a racist, authoritarian leader with a cult-like following who lies a lot, demonizes minorities, panders to the religious right and white nationalists, insists on strict loyalty, repels expert advisers, encourages armed supporters violent behavior, spurns international agreements, allies with other dictators, expands and modernizes the nuclear arsenal, denies facts like those from peer-reviewed science including the threat of climate collapse, doubles down on fossil fuels,… can fairly be called a fascist. It can happen here.

The DOJ needs to be an independent agency which cannot be politically influenced. Otherwise we go the way of the banana republic, punishing political enemies and rewarding insiders. If investigations of the President are not allowed, he is above the law. Yet another wound of the Constitution.

Remember Germany in the 1920's had a nice country before the right wing came along ?

Fixing Our Founders' Mistakes (12/29/2017)

Paul Krugman: Republicans Don't Give a Damn About Their Country or Its Constitution (5/19/2017)

Trump is Violating the Constitution (2/23/2017)

Donald Trump: A One-Man Constitutional Crisis

Justice Stevens Pens Six Amendments to Tune-Up Constitution (1/27/2015)

A Constitutional Scandal Worse Than Iran-Contra or Watergate (8/7/2014)

Our Broken Constitution (12/9/2013)

Where Framers of the Constitution Fell Short

Supplanting the United States Constitution: War, National Emergency and "Continuity of Government"

US government is dysfunctional. Neither of the major political parties will let the other accomplish anything, so we are not addressing major problems. Special interests and big money control the agenda, and the Supreme Court made things much worse by allowing Corporations to spend as much money as they like to influence elections.

Free Speech For People

On January 21, 2010, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that corporations are entitled to spend unlimited funds in our elections. The First Amendment was never intended to protect corporations. This cannot stand. Join our campaign to protest this decision. Protect our democracy! Free speech is for people — not corporations.

The 99% Declaration

Our politicians are either unable or unwilling to regulate themselves or protect us from economic predators like those who nearly led us into a second great depression in 2008. Many politicians are the unabashed paid agents of corporations, political action committees and the top 1% of wealth owners. The corporations and people who control these concentrated sources of wealth hire lobbyists and others to ply our politicians with gifts, money, inside financial information, promises of future benefits and unlimited campaign funding so they sellout to do their clients’ bidding. The United States of America is no longer a republican democracy. It is a poorly functioning corporate oligarchy. Through our own apathy and complacency, we have allowed our government and economy to be hijacked by professional corporatists who unceasingly crave money and power for its own sake regardless of the consequences. Fortunately, Americans are awakening and the Continental Congress 2.0 and resulting Petition for Redress of Grievances is one of many steps being taken by average people to “reboot” our democracy. (from the99declaration)

Because the broadest consensus on issues is most likely to be correct, democracy is the best way to govern. But our democracy is badly flawed. The Constitution is structured to favor wealth and red States, which are not governed well. The will of the people is mostly ignored. Money talks.

The Constitution is over two centuries old and very difficult to change. The Supreme Court shapes it. Because we have a partisan Supreme Court that insists on trying to determine the intent of the framers two centuries ago, the law is quite inflexible, obsolete, and unresponsive to people. The corporate supremacists use that to keep a wealthy minority governing, but that is an insult to democracy.

The Constitution is not framed to be democratic. It is structured in a way that elections can keep a minority in control. Disastrous, sociopath, Republican Presidents can win without vetting and without the popular vote. It is clear that the electoral College does not functioning to place qualified Presidential candidates in office, nor is President Trump the winner of the popular vote.

A fundamental assumption of the Constitution is the need for constant vigilance against concentration of power, but neglect of anti-trust law has resulted in monopolies in many industries forcing small business out, reducing competition shrinking the free market, reducing consumer and worker rights, and making corporations more powerful than government itself.

Republicans pushed the FCC for concentration of media, and in return media are lackeys for the Administration. Bush provoked two wars without any serious challenge. The Iraq War was based on twisted intelligence and that is a crime. Fox News and other right wing media promoted Trump lies, misinformation abut the pandemic, hate speech, and incited violence on the capital.

Without a free press there can be no democracy but maybe we should consider regulating to prevent hate speech and misinformation.

The Trump FCC further concentrated media. The rollback of net neutrality is ominous.

Due to a partisan Supreme Court, it is our misfortune to have a government that serves the wealthy, not the people. That is why we are threatened with Fascism, can't seem to break our addiction to militarism, and have a far flung empire.

After WWII new Constitutions were drafted for Germany and Japan. Having learned from the American model, theirs is better in some respects. FDR advocated a Second Bill of Rights that might have improved on our situation. Bernie Sanders has proposed a similar agenda. Nordic countries are structured better and perform better.

Campaign Finance

Campaign finance law underlies all other law.

Larry Lessig writes that we have lost our republic because politicians are beholden to the funders and not the people. Public financing of elections is necessary so that candidates are not beholden to money.

The US will no longer be a Republic if the middle class continues its descent. Income Inequality will accelerate as a result of the Republicans latest tax cut.

The Supreme Court has brought on a resurgence of Fascism with various of their decisions. The idea that the 'originalists' can prevent any challenge to a 200 year old document. The strange concept that corporations are people whose only responsibility is to make profit for their shareholders. Their interference in the election of George W Bush. Their ruling expanding the Second Amendment has brought us gun violence that is number one in the world. Their Citizens United decision allowing big dark money to buy government. Their roll-back of the voting-rights Act. The Creation of a secret court, the FISA Court, that operates in the dark and creates secret law, brought us to the National Security State. All because SCOTUS is populated with lifetime serving Republican, corporate supremacist hacks. Trump justices will certainly make matters much worse.

Political Parties

The two parties are nowhere in the Constitution.

It is clear that the two party monopoly has failed to properly vet candidates, has become corporate, polarized people and rendered government dysfunctional to an extent that the US is incapable of recognizing, let alone dealing with serious challenges.

The two party monopoly does not work for the people. It has resulted in gridlock and dysfunction. Allowing big money into politics has gamed the playing field for the wealthy. The US has become an oligopoly.

Media is controlled by oligarchs who decide what information is generally available. Real issues are usually not discussed.

Republicans make it more difficult to vote at every opportunity.

We should insist on Instant Runoff Voting or Range Voting for all of our elections to keep third parties from being spoilers and as a first step to weakening the two major parties.

Gerrymandering allows politicians to select voters instead of the other way around. It has resulted in the current crisis. Redistricting should be done by non-partisan entities.

See this note.

Elections

Good Americans believe in fair elections in which all votes are accurately counted. Voting machines are currently manufactured by Republican partisans and their inner workings are trade secrets. Media does not discuss real issues. For that and many other reasons (see the elections page), US elections cannot be trusted. Election procedures should be reformed and standardized.

We need voting machines to be open source, transparent, standardized, and auditable. Procedures should be in place to provide security and to audit results. This would be a good step to counter Russian interference in our elections.

Range voting ought to be in place at all levels: State, Local, and Federal.

Gerrymandering has polarized the Congress favoring Republicans.

Almost everyone agrees that the electoral college should be abolished.

Election procedures need substantial reform, but it is not even up for discussion. Media, in its own downward spiral, doesn't talk about it.

Corporations

Corporations, to retain their charter, must act like good citizens, since the law says they exist only for profit they are more often sociopaths. If they are too big to fail, they need public oversight. Yes, regulations. They are not people. Their political spending should at least be disclosed. If they act contrary to the public interest, they should lose their charter. Many of them are trans-national, so they have no allegiance except to profit. They can choose the most lax tax environment to have their headquarters, the lowest wage country to employ workers, and the most lax country to dispose of their waste. Manufacturing has moved off shore leaving factories abandoned and workers with only low paying jobs. Europeans require worker representation on their boards.

They need to be held responsible by building an international consensus. Globalization requires global institutions.

An amendment.

Presidency

Like many empires before, we are headed for an imperial head of state. It is contrary to the US Constitution that a single individual decides important matters on his own. Sometimes we have wise leaders, but more often they are quite fallible...if not outright self-serving. Congress has allowed much of its power to be usurped. Trump has whiplashed long established policy so that the US can no longer be trusted to uphold treaties that is was signed.

Another Republican bad idea is making the Presidency all-powerful. Bush, in signing statements made the law or distorted it beyond recognition. He thumbed his nose at international law.

Bush, like Nixon, argued that the President is above the law. The Constitution needs to be altered so that no President ever makes that mistake again.

The Danger from the Imperial Presidency

Supreme Court

Supreme Court justices should be held to the same ethical standards as is the rest of the judiciary.

It should be expanded so that a single individual cannot be making important decisions. Policy change after Presidential elections is destabilizing both domestically and internationally. It is partisan and therefore unjust.

Congress

The Congress is money driven and for that reason often does the wrong thing.

The debt ceiling should be ruled out as a weapon.

Government shutdown should not be an option.

Majority rule should be restored to the Congress.

War Powers

The US has been at almost perpetual war since WW II. Most wars were carried out by the CIA, and none of them have been successful. We are now experiencing what Chalmer's Johnson has richly described as blowback. Although we spend hundreds of billions of dollars annually on 'defense', we are still seriously threatened by a few people with box cutters, or even domestic right-wing terrorists who assault the capital. Because our politicians have visions of empire, our own people are not well served and the country is broke. Republicans want to cut domestic spending though, especially spending that might benefit people.

Without Congressional oversight, checks and balances are inoperable. Bush Republicans put the Constitution at risk by carrying on public dialog in secret, even Alan Greenspan admitted that the War in Iraq was about oil. All the other pretexts for the war have been discredited now. Massive quantities of emails from the White House have disappeared, so they are not available for Congressional scrutiny. A partisan Supreme Court, which also threw the election of 2000, protected Cheney's secret discussions of energy policy. Secrecy is a dagger in the heart of democracy and the Bush administration maximized its use.

Over the last centuries Europeans nearly destroyed themselves in horrendous wars. But they appear to have learned that a head of state who, on his own whim, can make war, can disappear people, can torture, can ignore habeas corpus, or can otherwise act without regard for law is a clear and present danger. After nearly destroying themselves, they have now limited their royalty to mostly ceremonial functions, and their people are more the deciders. That's what democracy is about.

In contempt of Congress, transparency, and democratic principle, Bush minions refused to testify before Congress. They should be held accountable and Republicans should be driven from office.

A few months ago, a 'blue ribbon' commission decided that the 1973 law which attempted to decide whether the Congress or the President had war power decided that the old law was 'quaint' and needed to be revised to give the President the power to make war after discussion with Congressional leaders. Get real. A President that can go to war at will and, without accountability, operate without restraint, is a dictator. In history, such strong-men governments have been typical of countries building empire.

National War Powers Commission

There is nothing in the Constitution that supports the policy of the Bush administration that we need to remake the Middle East. Anyway it likely cannot be done with military force.

When the US signed the UN charter it agreed to go to war only in self defense. Did we do that ?

Media

Media has become too corporate, too concentrated, and its message is not in the public interest. Such media, particularly talk radio, has clearly shown the way to fascism. There should be a mix of public and private media so that the corporate voice is not the only one. Without good information, we cannot have an informed public, or fair elections. We should follow Canada's lead and sanction broadcasters if they lie.

Religion

Medieval religions are a major cause of wars and terrorism. They are divisive, often uncompromising, and since they indoctrinate with the unbelievable, they degrade education with misinformation, and they polarize our politics. They are often highly profitable as well. Some have become propaganda channels for Republicans and, as such, they enabled the disastrous Bush adventures, denied likely environmental catastrophe, incited violence, and, more recently, have shutdown government. If they preach violence, they should at least lose their tax exempt status.

The wall separating Church and State needs shoring up.

Secrecy

Secrecy is corrosive for all traditional American values and it continues to expand to cover up much of our government. The national security state is designed to stamp out opposition to the agenda of building a world dominating empire. Whistleblowers, who might leak real information, are quickly silenced. Our prisons are bursting. Torture became routine.

Arianna Huffington Karl Rove's Contempt for the Constitution and the Public's Right to Know

The Bush Administration was probably one of the most secretive. Lack of information led to dysfunctional Constitutional checks and balances.

Covert agencies with secret, undisclosed budgets continue to operate in ways that Americans would never approve. They are (and ought to be) unconstitutional.

Secrecy Report Card 2007

'Intelligence'

Secret agencies construct our view of the outside world, provide controlled versions to media, and frame issues to justify actions. The pretext for the war in Iraq, for example, was made to fit the policy.

Communism was a red flag used to justify an immense arms buildup and a justification for the permanent war. When the USSR fell apart, we needed a new adversary and that after a period of time became Muslims. We have engaged in a new crusade. Since religious war is politically incorrect, we now have a new enemy that can never be defeated: namely terrorism. Since terrorism will always be with us, we can have an endless war. This pleases corporate war profiteers.

Secrecy is poisonous for a Constitutional government.

FISA

Wiretappings True Danger

FISA Bill's real target is freedom of the Press

Thank Senator Dodd for fighting FISA

Senator Feingold: The Problems with the FISA Bill

Posted: 09 Jul 2008 11:59 PM CDT

I cannot believe that we are still debating the legality of this program on the Senate floor, and that anyone seriously believes that merely notifying the Gang of Eight - while keeping the full intelligence committees in the dark - somehow represents congressional approval. -- Senator Russ Feingold more... | PDA

There are a few in Congress who take their oath seriously and actually do protect the Constitution.

Thank Senator Dodd for being one of them. He has opposed the warrentless surveillance, FISA, law relentlessly.

Civil Liberties

National Security State

Bill of Rights

Patriot Act

Empire

The framers of the Constitution probably never anticipated, and might be disgusted, that we have become an empire. It should make our pursuit of empire unconstitutional. That would reduce these enemies of democracy: a large standing army and the military-industrial-Congressional complex, and redirect our productive energy toward domestic improvement...like overhauling our ricketty infrastructure.

The massive tax burden that we have for empire and military destructiveness might be relieved and we might regain some of our civil liberties. Our middle class might not sink as fast.