Interview: John Birch Society’s Art Thompson Speaks on the Dangers of Con Con

 By: Joshua Cook Apr 5, 2015


There is a growing movement among limited-government activists who believe that a Constitutional Convention could solve a lot of America’s balanced budget problems.

Many writers for BenSwann.com have been critical of a Constitutional Convention (Con Con) in the past (see here and here), but the movement has evolved from theory into a growing movement. Many bills for a Con Con are being debated in state houses throughout America.

BenSwann.com’s Joshua Cook spoke to  Art Thompson, CEO of John Birch Society, about the problems with the Con Con, pro-Constitutional Convention, movement.

Cook said that he had friends on both sides of the debate who all want the government to be fiscally responsible, so what’s wrong with those calling for a balanced budget amendment?

“The purpose of it is to rein in the government. So, I would ask the question, does the Constitution now rein in the government? And the answer, of course, is no. The problem is that it wouldn’t matter if you have some change in the Constitution for the better. Would they pay any attention to that anymore than they do to the Constitution today?” asked Thompson.

“The problem is not the Constitution and having to make additions to the Constitution. The problem is adhering to the Constitution we have,” he explained.

Thompson explained that he is all for a balanced budget, but he said standing between the government and a balanced budget are roadblocks.

“We say this unless you repeal two amendments to the Constitution, it will be next to impossible to have a balanced budget,” he said.

“Because what we used to have in this country  was a system of checks and balances between the House and the Senate and the Executive, but once we got the 16th Amendment, the income tax, and once we got the 17th Amendment, the direct election of senators, that threw the whole system to a tailspin. And we’ve never recovered from it,” he added.

“Most people do not understand the implications of those two amendments and how they have destroyed checks and balances between the states and the federal government,” he said. “All you need to do is repeal them, and you’d have a balanced budget if we went back to the old system.”

Thompson said that America’s problems need fixing, but a Constitutional Convention movement is not the answer.

One of his issues with organizations, like Call A Convention, is the bipartisan nature of the group and the questionable sources of its funding.

“There has been 10s of millions of dollars contributed to this campaign, and we don’t know where it’s coming from. In fact, when you take a look at the people involved and the organizations involved, there is more of a case that this is a leftist movement than a conservative movement,” he said.

Call A Convention’s backers, according to their website include conservative Mark Levin and Wolf PAC, an organization that has roots in the Occupy Wall Street movement.

Thompson said that there is no room for bipartisanship, because liberals’ and conservatives’ philosophies are different.

“Bipartisanship has gotten us into the problem. Bipartisanship is another word for compromise in my book. You either stand for the Constitution or you don’t,” he explained. “The problem has been is that the conservatives always compromise with the left. And that compromise with the left has gotten us where we are today.”

These bipartisan groups contain people with radically different viewpoints.

“Some of these people want to get rid of the 2nd Amendment, or if they can’t get rid of it, to add a couple extra words that make it impossible for a citizen in the United States to have the right to keep and bear arms unless they belong to a state militia,” he added.
Are those the type of people we want gathering to amend, or rewrite, our Constitution?

“Conservatives professing that all they want is a balanced budget, but they’re in bed with some leftists who have a completely different agenda. That doesn’t compute logically in my brain,” he said.

Another issue is that the balanced budget amendment would be written during the convention.

“Now I’ve seen a number of balance budget proposals, not one of them would balance the budget,” he explained.

One of the problems with the proposal is the Federal Reserve.
“You cannot balance the budget of the United States unless you take into account the Federal Reserve,” he said. The Federal Reserve allows the government to spend money it doesn’t actually have.

“And yet the Federal Reserve can keep the presses rolling and they might do it in a way of currency exchanges, which is how they’re bailing out Europe right now. They are sending palettes of $100 bills to Europe, and they’re sending us back palettes of Euros. Now we don’t spend the Euros. They’re put in a basement someplace. But Europe spends the dollars,” he explained.

“That to me, is not a balance. It’s a whole unethical means of bailing out Europe,” he said.

And we know the government has emergencies like this all of the time.

Another problem with the balanced budget proposals they don’t account for how much money the federal government gives the states, many of which don’t have their owned balanced budgets.
Thompson also suggests repealing departments and services that aren’t Constitutionally backed. Those include things like Obamacare and departments of education and energy.
“All of those things are off budget, and yet those things are bankrupting this whole country,” he said.
To pay for those unconstitutional agencies, taxes could be raised.
“If we don’t repeal the 16th and 17th Amendments, a balanced budget will tax our economy to its knees.”
To learn more about the John Birch Society, visit their website.

State Legislative Battles Heat Up

—  JBS Weekly Member Update  — February 2, 2015

State Legislative Battles Heat Up In the battle of controlling federal tyranny, state legislatures play a key role. The states have the responsibility of protecting its citizens from the overreaches of an unconstitutional federal government. And they have a number of tools at their disposal. But getting the state legislature to stand up for the citizens usually requires some level of education on your part. First of all, legislators need to understand the federal government is limited in its role as spelled out in the Constitution. For instance, the responsibilities of the Congress, as originally delegated to it by the states in 1787, are housed in Article I, Section 8. According to the 10th Amendment, responsibilities outside of these limits are reserved to the states or the people. With that simple understanding, state legislators should work toward countering Congress each time it ventures outside of its constitutional limitations. Unfortunately, states do not have a great history of standing up to the federal government. If they did, states would not be as financially dependent upon the federal government as 2012 Census data demonstrates: "State Budget Solutions found that all state governments combined received 31.6 percent of their general revenue from the federal government in 2012." Realize that the role you play locally and in your state is much more important than any federal election will ever be. Right now, JBS members and supporters are working in each state to stop legislation antithetical to freedom. They are also educating legislators on their role and working to recruit others. If you're not involved, do so today! At the very least, start by signing up for our legislative alerts, so you can send your elected state and federal officials emails about what they should be supporting. We have been closely monitoring states that are introducing resolutions to ask Congress to call a constitutional convention. Email alerts have been sent out to those in affected areas. Be sure to let your legislators know of your support for keeping the Constitution as written, instead of opening it up for rewrite. As history has proven, constitutional conventions cannot be controlled. Are you ready to join? via JBS

A Fairy Tale That Could Destroy Our Nation

By:  Larry Greenley

01/16/2015

Three Reasons to Oppose All State Article V Convention Applications

Right off the bat, don’t be fooled by the Con-Con proponents’ constant harping on how Article V is the brilliant gift bequeathed to us by the Founders, and how we must use it now to save the Constitution. The Founders’ brilliant gift is the entire Constitution, not just Article V.

Moreover, it’s revealing just how little the proponents of an Article V convention (aka a convention of the states, a constitutional convention, or a Con-Con) talk about restoring the Constitution as originally intended.

1. The Constitution Is Not the Problem.
We must correct all those Article V convention proponents who constantly refer to the need to rein in our “out-of-control” government. What we are actually facing is an “out-of-compliance-with-the-Constitution” government. Therefore, the Constitution is not the problem, so changing the Constitution with an Article V convention is not the solution. The only true solution, as daunting as it may appear, is a large-scale, grassroots, constitutional education program that would inform the electorate sufficiently to demand adherence to the Constitution from their representatives. Without such an informed electorate, no form of constitution, whether our current Constitution, a revised Constitution, or a completely rewritten constitution, will work.

As James Madison stated in a speech at the Virginia Ratifying Convention on June 20, 1788:

But I go on this great republican principle, that the people will have virtue and intelligence to select men of virtue and wisdom. Is there no virtue among us? If there be not, we are in a wretched situation. No theoretical checks — no form of government can render us secure. To suppose that any form of government will secure liberty or happiness without any virtue in the people, is a chimerical idea.

Or, as Thomas Jefferson said in a similar vein in a letter to Colonel Charles Yancey on January 6, 1816: “If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be.”

2. All Article V Conventions Would Have the Inherent Power to Be Runaway Conventions.

To their great credit, most state legislators have voted down most Article V convention applications over the past thirty years, based on their belief that such a convention could easily become a “runaway convention” that could make harmful changes to the Constitution. In truth, all Article V conventions would have the inherent power to be “runaway conventions” that could propose harmful revisions to the Constitution as well as provide for new methods for ratification that would increase the likelihood that the harmful revisions would be adopted.

Such conventions would consolidate the inherent powers of a free people, whose right “to alter or abolish” our government is described in the Preamble of the Declaration of Independence:

That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

Based on this right as proclaimed in the Declaration of Independence coupled with the precedent of the Constitutional Convention of 1787, an Article V convention would therefore be empowered to rewrite the Constitution without any limit on its action. In this sense such a convention would be superior to Congress, the Executive Branch, and Supreme Court, or any state legislature as well. In Federalist No. 78, Madison justified the legitimacy of the 1787 Constitutional Convention by referring to the “fundamental principle of republican government, which admits the right of the people to alter or abolish the established Constitution, whenever they find it inconsistent with their happiness.”

Therefore, on the one hand, we acknowledge the transcendent blessings we’ve received from the Constitution of 1787; however, on the other hand, we must warn against the great dangers to our freedoms and rights that would be posed by an inherently unlimited Article V convention at this time in our nation’s history. See the next section for why we say this.

3. An Article V Convention Would Enable Powerful Special Interests to Revise the Constitution in Their Favor.

A Rasmussen poll of 1,000 likely voters conducted April 15-16, 2014 found that 67% “view the federal government today as a special interest group that looks out primarily for its own interests.”

What this poll result indicates is that about two-thirds of likely voters believe that special interests now control our federal government.

Which is to say that it is a fairly widely shared belief that our government is controlled by powerful special interest groups, such as Big Business, Big Labor, Big News Media, the Education Establishment, Foundations, Internationalist Foreign Policy Organizations, Big Political Donors, etc.

It is these special interest groups that over the last century or so have influenced public officials to usurp powers not granted in the Constitution.

Proponents of an Article V convention assure us that delegates appointed by state legislatures can propose amendments, the amendments can be ratified by the states, and the resulting amendments will miraculously rein in our “out-of-control” federal government. This starry-eyed scenario is a major fairy tale. Not only do special interests have working control over the federal government, they also have powerful influence over state legislatures. The power elites mentioned above have learned how to elect and influence federal and state legislators a very long time ago. You don’t believe it?

Just try working with other grassroots activists to stop the special interests’ Common Core education standards juggernaut in your state, and see how far you get!

As another striking example of just how pervasive special interests’ influence is over state legislatures, consider the current campaign by multinational corporations and internationalist foreign policy organizations in cooperation with the Obama administration and Republican leaders in Congress to merge the United States into a Trans-Pacific Union and a Trans-Atlantic Union via the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) agreements. Such mergers would mean the end of our national independence and personal freedoms as secured by the Constitution.

Nevertheless, the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), which boasts of nearly 300 corporate and private foundation members (including many leading multinational corporations) and nearly 2,000 state legislator members (out of the national total of about 7,000), officially supports both the TPP and TTIP agreements on its website. Furthermore, ALEC is a major supporter of Article V conventions and has been for several decades. For further information read, “The Not-so-smart ALEC” by Bill Jasper, posted at TheNewAmerican.com on April 21, 2014, and “How the Free Trade Agenda Is Knocking Down America,” a Special Report of The New American, September 2, 2013 (order copies at ShopJBS.org or also available as a PDF at JBS.org).

Since powerful special interest groups have such extensive influence over the federal and state levels of government, the most likely result of one or more Article V conventions would be changes in the Constitution that legitimize the myriad usurpations of power that have already taken place in the service of the special interests. This would make it all the harder for We the People to ever regain control of the government from the special interests and secure our God-given rights.

What is absolutely necessary is to energize and inform enough citizens to turn this situation around. In order to secure our freedom, we must create an informed electorate that will roll back the power of the special interests by electing federal and state representatives who will enforce the Constitution as originally intended by the Founding Fathers.

The solution is the Constitution, not Article V.

(To learn more and take action on this issue, go to our "Choose Freedom — STOP A CON-CON" action project page.)
(This article was originally published in the February 2015 issue of the JBS Bulletin.)

Government corruption: Dismantling the Post Office

While the crooked and immoral capitalists are the powers behind the evisceration of our Constitutional rule of law, focusing on their means is of a much greater concern. Lobbying (buying) the states for a Constitutional Convention (Con-Con) by the American fascisti would be the coup de grâce for our Republic as we know it. The US Post Office IS one of the few fedgov agencies authorized by our Constitution. Let’s keep it so.

More videos like this

And what happens to privacy now?

Though postal work used to be a uplifting career with great opportunities, in the modern economy workers are being pushed too hard to keep up with other communication mediums. 

The industry, like many, favors the interests of big business before the interests of its own employees. This has led to unprecedented amounts of stress in the postal environment, sometimes leading to homicide and suicide.

The documentary “Gone Postal” hopes to get the message out that the postal industry - and its workers - needs to be saved.

Note: Users of the postal service are guaranteed privacy of communication by statute. Users of FedEx, UPS, and digital communication are not.

Back When New York State Citizens Enjoyed the Constitutional Rule of Law

How the 1846 New York State Con-Con took NY from Jeffersonian Democracy into Today's Whiggism

Imagine the horror today if our politicians were entrusted with a constitutional convention! Never mind they don't honor the one they've got, let alone even read it! You, too, can be a Locofoco, just do it.


DEMOCRACY AND LAISSEZ FAIRE: THE NEW YORK STATE CONSTITUTION OF 1846
 
ARTHUR A. EKIRCH, JR.
Department of History, Stale University of New York,Albany

New York's current financial woes have a precedent, and perhaps a solution, in the pages of the distant past. Well back in its history, in the late 1830s, New York State was spending and lending money lavishly. By the early 1840s, the rapidly mounting debt had occasioned a severe financial crisis.

To avert the imminent possibility of bankruptcy and default, the state legislature in 1842 passed what was known as "the stop and tax law", a levy of one mill on each dollar of taxable property. The new revenue helped the state meet its most pressing obligations. 

But, even more importantly in  terms of the future, New York decided to take steps to prevent another such fiscal disaster.

Ambitious projects for internal improvements -mostly canal construction and loans for railroad building -were cut back or abandoned unless there was a reasonable expectation that they could be funded from tolls or taxation. And the legislature also issued a call for a constitutional convention. The new Constitution adopted in 1846 placed strict limits on the state's ability to borrow money.

Thus the people of New York, facing problems similar to the state's later predicament, found the answer in an old-fashioned program of reduced spending and new taxes. What is surprising, however, is that such policies had the popular support of the most democratic and liberal elements in the state.

To understand the unusual sequence of events which culminated in the New York State Constitution of 1846, one must go back in history to the Jacksonian era and the political struggles between the Democrats and the Whigs. In New York the Jacksonian Democrats included a wide-ranging constituency of radical workingmen, Irish immigrants, farmers, intellectuals, and representatives of the new rising business or small capitalist class. 

The preponderance of the older landed aristocracy and wealthier classes, together with the most English or Anglo-Saxon elements in the population, gravitated toward the Whig Party. The Whigs, united nationally by their opposition to Andrew Jackson's Presidency, were the ideological heirs in New York State of DeWitt Clinton, five times governor and father of the Erie Canal. Like Clinton, the Whigs supported the generous use of of state funds for internal improvements as well as for various cultural, humanitarian, and educational endeavors. The Whigs' belief in positive government and social reform reflected their paternalistic conception of politics and economics.~'

Quite different were the ideas of the Democrats who, in contrast to their Whig opponents, stood for a strict construction of the United States Constitution, limiting the governing power to its least essentials. Both nationally and in New York State, the Jacksonian Democrats adhered to the Jeffersonian agrarian maxim that the least government it the best government. In New York the leader of the Democratic Party was Martin Van Buren, head of the famed Albany Regency which controlled the state governmental machinery through most of the 1830s and '40s. The most radical Democrats, known as Locofocos, were somewhat to the left of Van Buren and the Regency. They included an interesting collection of intellectuals and politicians who espoused a negative, anti-statist democracy. As against the paternalistic philosophy of the Whigs, the Locofoco Democrats stressed complete laissez faire in government-business relations. For example, the introduction in 1837 to the first issue of the United States Magazine and Democratic Review, organ of the more radical Democrats, defined the party's belief in democratic republicanism and majority rule.  

But the editors added:

The best government is that which governs least. No human depositories can, with safety, be trusted with the power of legislation upon the general interests of society so as to operate directly or indirectly on the industry and property of the community. Such power must be perpetually liable to the most pernicious abuse, from the natural imperfection, both in wisdom of judgment and purity of purpose, of all human legislation, exposed constantly to the pressure of partial interests; interests which, at the same time that they are essentially selfish and tyrannical, are ever vigilant, persevering, and subtle in all the arts of deception and corruption.~~~

Most forthright of the radical Democrats was William Leggett, a Locofoco colleague in the 1830s of such New York Democratic writers as James Fenimore Cooper, William Cullen Bryant, Theodore Sedgwick, and Parke Godwin. Leggett coupled adherence to the Jeffersonian natural rights philosophy with demands for the equal right to property, not its abolition. 

Governments had no warrant to interfere with individual pursuits by offering financial advantages to any particular class or industry. 

Specially chartered banks, including the Bank of the United States, were a favorite target of Leggett's scorn. "Let the banks perish," he wrote. "Now is the time for the complete emancipation of trade from legislative thralldom."~~~

As a part of their general laissez-faire philosophy and opposition to Whig paternalism, the Democrats were also dubious of those social and humanitarian reform movements which infringed upon individual liberty and private property. Thus they were hostile to the abolitionists even though this meant ignoring the question of freedom for the black slave.

Imprisonment for debt attracted little attention from either Democrats or workingmen until public interest in the matter became too strong to be ignored. The workingmen's parties were, however, in a peculiar position because wage earners wanted preferential creditor status through a mechanics' lien law. Even public schools had difficulty winning Democratic support because their expense involved heavier taxation. Charity schools and use of the Lancastrian system of pupil tutors instead won Democratic favor. A system of statewide public education would also interfere with parents' control over their children and might undermine religious freedom.141

In Washington, Andrew Jackson, the Democrats' hero, enjoyed an uneasy and , controvercial Presidency. His years in office from 1829 to 1837 formed an era in which easy credit, cheap land, and internal improvements all contributed to an inflationary prosperity.

At the same time, Jackson's own inclinations tended toward the limitations on federal spending favored by his friend and political adviser Van Buren. 

As governor of New York in 1828, Van Buren had secured passage of the Safety Fund System to safeguard the banks and assure the state of a source of credit and wealth to go along with the Erie Canal. The state-chartered New York banks cast doubt on the need for the federal United States Bank, while the state-constructed Erie Canal rebuked the western states' clamor for federal aid for their own internal improvements. Moreover, the Jeffersonian principle of states' rights and opposition to federal centralized power, espoused by Van Buren and the New York Locofoco Democrats, was also able to gain national success by Jackson's Bank of the United States and Maysville Road vetoe~.'~l

In 1836 the United States for the only time in its history was without a national debt; a year later the federal government was briefly in a position to distribute its surplus revenues to the states.

But the Jacksonians, despite the President's efforts to moderate or level out the economic boom, were unable to ward off its financial aftermath in the Panic of 1837. Van Buren, Jackson's successor in the White House, fell a political victim to the Panic, and in New York in 1838 the Democrats were overturned by the Whigs who elected William H. Seward as governor.

Governor Seward, it should be noted, was an admirer of DeWitt Clinton who had earlier helped inaugurate the transportation revolution in New York. Upon completion of the Erie Canal in 1825, he had urged further state expenditures for new canals, turnpikes, and eventually railroads, as well as a generous policy of chartering banks and insurance companies.

Now, in 1840, the Whigs under Governor Seward called for the appropriation of four million dollars for ten years to build additional canals and railroads. Henceforth dubbed "the forty million dollar party", the Whigs to their misfortune had ignored the adverse effects of the Panic of 1837 on the state's declining credit.

Alarmed critics warned that the cost of public works would soon increase the state debt to as much as 75 million dollars with annual interest charges of 4.5 million. Already by 1842, when the Democrats regained control of the legislature and passed the stop and tax law, the state debt which five years earlier amounted to 7 million dollars had grown to 27 million dollars, and state bonds were unmarketable even at a discount of 20%. Instead of continuing to spend money for internal improvements, the Democrats, at a cost of 40 million dollars in principal and interest, proposed to extinguish the state debt in twenty years.

As a result of such conservative fiscal policies, within two months of the stop and tax law the state's 7% bonds sold at par, while 5% bonds reached that level in I5 months.~~I

By the 1840s national opinion in regard to state aid for internal improvements was under-going a change. The former public enthusiasm for heavy state expenditures had run its course.

Some of the new states in the West were in default on their bonds. 
State initiative and responsibility had been necessary earlier for such ambitious undertakings as the Erie Canal, but after the return of prosperity in the 1840s private capital, just beginning to be accumulated by American manufacturing and industry, was available for investment. Railroads were now becoming the most important means of transportation, but railroads with their special rolling stock could not be considered public in the same sense as a canal, a river, or a turnpike. Although railroad builders frequently turned to the states to help raise the large amounts of capital they required, most of their funds in New York came from individual savings and from credit extended by American banks. Accordingly, while there was little foreign investment in, or municipal aid for, New York State railroads until after the Civil War, the New York Central by 1853 had 2331 stockholders.~"

The decline of public aid and intervention in economic enterprise was most marked in some of the eastern states where the old colonial concept of the commonwealth fell victim to a surge of anti-government feeling. Although various economic and social groups continued to desire political intervention in behalf of their own self-interests, the fear of more state taxes and increasing state indebtedness blocked heavy public expenditures throughout the 1840s. Instead of continuing to take a positive, direct role in the economy, the state granted its economic powers to private banks and stock companies. For example, the Free Banking Act passed by New York in 1838 abolished the old system requiring special legislation for each bank charter and in effect introduced competition into banking. Under general incorporation laws, state charters were now granted to all manner of enterprises which, in pursuing their own private ends, were largely freed of the public responsibility associated with governmental agencies and the earlier semiprivate corporation. Democratic reluctance to continue the specially chartered corporation for a favored few had dispersed the privilege of incorporation among many stockholders and had separated it from responsibility to the state.IB1

Legislation for free banking and general incorporation laws accordingly had the support not only of the business community but also of those opposed to all governmental aid and protection for selected enterprises. Locofoco Democrats and workingmen united in the crusade against economic monopoly and special privilege, although labor sometimes identified its own true interest with that of the whole community. In any case, the state was usually too weak in an administrative sense to enforce either its own definition of the public interest, or to give its full support to various private or special interest groups.

Thus laissez faire and the cry of equal rights for all and special privileges for none was a more appealing political philosophy in the 1830s and '40s than any Whiggish notions of a paternalistic and expensive government.lgl

It was in response to these views that the Democrats pushed ahead with their plans for drafting a new state constitution. William C. Bouck, the conservative or Hunker Democratic successor to Seward as governor in 1843 and 1844, favored a moderate course on internal improvements despite the Democrats' stop and tax law of 1842. But when Silas Wright, a close friend of Van Buren and the staunchest disciple of Jeffersonian agrarian democracy in New York State, was put forward for the nomination of governor, Bouck and the conservative Hunker faction had to retreat. Wright in his first annual governor's message in January 1845 praised the stop and tax law for restoring the state's credit. Three fifths of the state's debt charged to the General Fund, he pointed out, had been incurred by unwise loans to railroads that had proved unable to pay their obligations.

Wright also announced that he favored calling a constitutional convention.flOl

In a series of articles analyzing the progress of constitutional reform, which appeared at this time in the Democratic Review, John Bigelow, one of the party's intellectuals, listed some of the changes which he believed New York and other states should adopt.

These included a provision that "The state should have no power to contract debts, or loan its credit, except in case of war, invasion, or insurrection." In the matter of a general incorporation law, Bigelow urged: "The members of such corporations, (not excepting those established for education or charity) should be individually liable for the debts, liabilities, and acts of such Corporation, and for the consequences resulting therefrom."

Furthermore: "All laws or regulations interfering with the liberty of trade or industry (such as license and inspection laws) should be abolished, and their enactment for the future prohibited." Bigelow added as miscellaneous proposals the abolishment of the death penalty and permission for women to control their own property after marriage.l1'1

The New York Constitutional Convention, which met in the summer of 1846, completed its labors in time for the voters to approve its handiwork that same year. Although the anti-statist views of such Jeffersonian Democrats as Bigelow and Wright were subject to some modification and compromise, the New York Constitution of 1846 embodied the laissez-faire position better than any document in the state's history. Only after all debts were paid through a sinking fund could the state appropriate any surplus for canal improvements and extensions not already mandated by law. Corporations including banks were to be chartered under general laws rather than by special act. Stockholders were made liable to the amount of their shares for all debts and liabilities contracted by their banks. As an epitaph to the anti-rent wars which had reached a climax in 1846, the Constitution abolished all feudal tenures and perpetual leases. Male suffrage was made universal except for Negroes who had to possess an estate of the value of $250, unless the people in a referendum on the question voted other-wise"2'.

This curious and illiberal provision, which was approved by the voters, retained the clause in the 1821 Constitution in which the property qualification was removed for whites but not for blacks.

The Negro vote, traditionally cast in favor of the old Federalist slaveowning class, had continued to be exercised in behalf of Clinton and then the Whigs. Though never a large vote, it was opposed by the Democrats chiefly because of labor's influence.l13'

In a retrospect the article on constitutional government in the Democratic Review, Bigelow reiterated his libertarian views with then warning that "A great source of inequality in the conditions of men in respect of wealth and comfort arises from the action of law.

Too much government has a direct tendency to aid one man or one set of men in the 'pursuit of happiness', and in the 'acquiring, possessing, and protecting property', if not at the expense of the rest, at least without rendering them the like assistance."~'"

Unfortunately the Jacksonians, despite their defeat of the Bank of the United States, had not been able to slow the growth of wealth and inequality in New York and some of the larger cities in the East in the era before the Civil War. But their more radical laissez-faire views, as embodied in the stop and tax law and 1846 Constitution, disenchanted the wealthier business class which moved more than ever into the Whig Party. Work on the Erie Canal, which the Democrats had stopped in 1842, was resumed in 1847. 

Moreover, until 1850 railroads had to pay canal tolls to protect the state's vested interested in "Clinton's ditch". 

After that, canal tolls were reduced to provide competition to the growing volume of traffic carried by the railroads~.I'~1during the Jacksonian Era," Journal of American Historians of a later generation have grown reinforces the view of the age of Jackson as essentially accustomed to interpreting democracy and one of laissez faire in terms of the modern welfare state. The negative democracy of the New York State Democrats of the 1840s accordingly wins little contemporary approval. Democracy in the eyes of its later adherents has become synonymous with power, preferably such power as may be exercised by a strong executive in the name of the people. Some historians even question whether the negative state can be democratic and reason that laissez faire must automatically favor an aristocracy of wealth. But what passes for the welfare state today rewards most of all its largest investors in the military-industrial complex. Beneficiaries of the welfare-warfare state's largesse would be horrified by a return to the spirit of the 1840s or to any consistent across-the-board application of laissez faire. 

Meanwhile New York's Constitution of 1846 remains an interesting, though passing, example of the enactment of Jeffersonian anti-statism into the fundamental law. 

[your on your own with the bibliography & footnotes. Sorry for the jumbling, but c'est la vie, n'est pas? See the PDF source at Mises.org for clarity. ]

NOTES York (New York: Oxford University Press, 1%7).
10. John A. Garraty, Silas Wright (New York: Columbia
I. Useful general interpretations include: Dixon Ryan Fox, University Press, 1949), pp. 292, 335.
The Decline of Aristocracy in the Politics of New York, I I. "The Progress of Constitutional Reform in the United
1801-1840, ed. Robert V. Remini (1st pub. 1919; New States," United Stares Magazine and Democratic
Yark: Harper Torchbooks, 1965): Edward Pessen, Review, Val. 18 (June, 1846). pp. 408-412, 420.
Jocksonion America: Society, Personolily, and Politics 12. New York State Constitution of 1846, Article I, Section
(Homewood, Ill.: Dorsey Press, 1968); Glyndon G. 1% 11, 1; Vll, I, 2, 3,; VIII, I, 4, 7.
Van Deusen, "Aspects of Whig Thought in the 13. Fox, Decline of Aristocracy, p. 269.
Jacksonian Period," American Historical Review, Vol. 14. "Constitutional Governments," United States Maga-
63 (January, 1958). pp. 305-322. zine ond Democratic Review, Vol. 20 (March, 1847).
2.
"Introduction." United States Magmine and Dem- p. 202.
ocrotic Review, Vol. I (October, 1837). p. 6. 15. Edward Pessen, Riches, Closs, ond Power before the
3.
On Leggett, see his A Collection of rhe Political Civil War (Lexington, Mass.: D. C. Heath, 1973);
Writings, ed. Theodore Sedgwick, Jr. (2 vols.; New Frank Otto Gatell, "Money and Party in Jacksonian
Yark: Taylor& Dodd, 1840); and the studies by Richard America: A Quantitative Look at New York City's Men
Hofstadter, "William Leggett: Spokesman of Jack-of Quality," Politico1 Science Quarterly, Vol. 82
sonian Democracy," Political Science Quarterly, Vol. (Januarv. 1967). OD. 235-252: Don. C. Sowers. The
~ork~tare
58 (December, 1943). pp. 581-594; Marvin Meyers, The knonci~l~isto~~h/~ew from 1789 1; 1912
  JacksonianPersuasion: Polirics and Belief (Stanford, (New York: Columbia University Studies, 1914). pp.
75 RC R7
Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1957), chap. 9; . -, --, -. .
Edward K. Spann. Ideals & Politics.. New York 16. See, for example, Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., The Age
Intellectuals ond Liberal Democracy, 1820-1880 of Jackson (Boston: Little-Brown, 1945). pp. 512-514,
(Albany: State University of New Yark Press, 1972). 519-521; Lee Benson, The Concept of Jacksonian
4. Herbert Ershkowilz and William G. Shade, "Consensus Democracy: New York asa Test Case(Princeton, M. 1.:
or Conflict? Political Behavior in the State Legislatures Princeton University Press, 1961), pp. 220ff.

Communists, Socialists, Republican Neocons & DSA Conspire to Merge the US in the NAU under Tutelage of CFR

Treason to be sure, but why is your state legislature so reticent to inform you why they are coalescing to surrender their citizen's liberty? Would be nice to hear how the state national guards feel about being sold out at the top.

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Faux Conservatives Defend the North American Union

Written by  Daniel Sayani

The Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) 2005 report “Building a North American Community" not only clearly outlined how George W. Bush’s lax policy on illegal immigration served to build the foundation of a North American Union, but also revealed the extent of Republican influence toward the creation of the NAU. 

Republican task force members who authored the blueprint for the NAU include Heidi Cruz [wife of Ted Cruz R-TX...CV,Ed.](Economic Director for the Western Hemisphere at the National Security Council under Condoleezza Rice), Richard Falkenrath (Bush’s Deputy Homeland Security Adviser and fellow at the neoconservative Brookings Institution), and Carla Hills (a former Assistant Attorney General and U.S. Trade Representative under Presidents Ford and George H.W. Bush).

Most revealing among the group is William Weld, a stereotypical Establishment Republican: socially well-heeled, wealthy, Anglo-American, Episcopalian, and socially liberal, in the mold of Nelson Rockefeller. A former prosecutor under the Reagan administration and Governor of Massachusetts, Weld authored an op-ed, “North America the Beautiful,” in the Wall Street Journal of March 23, 2005, advocating a North American Union, and coached Bush during his 2004 debates against John Kerry. He helped steer the judicial structure of Massachusetts in a pro-gay marriage direction through his appointment of African National Congress-linked Margaret Marshall, Chief Justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Court (the ANC is a member of the Socialist International). Weld himself also moonlights as a gay marriage celebrant, and offers his services pro bono to the Log Cabin Republicans.

Weld endorsed Barack Obama in 2008, and was internationalist President Bill Clinton’s nominee for U.S. Ambassador to Mexico in 1996. Then-Senate Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Jesse Helms (R-N.C.) courageously blocked Weld’s nomination because of his pervasive liberal stances, as reported by "The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer":

Senator Helms does not like what this governor stands for when it comes to drug policy, doesn’t think it’s appropriate to have [as] the United States ambassador to Mexico, where we have one of the biggest problems, that is, the importation of drugs from Mexico, a man who is more than soft on drugs. He [Weld] is a libertarian on drug use, believes that drugs should be de-criminalized or legalized.

His record as a United States attorney ranked him, I think, in the bottom two or three when it came to drug prosecutions, so his personal philosophy on drugs carried over to his official duties, so it’s argued. 

On top of that, conservatives in the Republican Party would be displeased to see a man like Governor Weld [as U.S. Ambassador to Mexico], who has been so in-your-face about his views compared to those of what Republicans like to think of as their mainstream conservative views.

Helms, notably a good friend of Rep. Larry McDonald (D-Ga.), was the only senator to open an inquiry into the Soviet shoot-down of KAL Flight 007, which claimed the life of McDonald, who was formerly the Chairman of The John Birch Society.

Not surprisingly, Weld’s comrade, Governor Paul Cellucci (R-Mass.), also a social liberal in the Weld form, is another advocate of the North American Union. In a 2006 speech before the Canadian Defense and Foreign Affairs Institute, Cellucci argued for North American economic integration and the inevitable supranational entity it would create:

Incrementally, we will continue to integrate our economies because I believe it is in each of our national interests to do so. And along the way, I think we’ll do a couple of things and I think that, well more than a couple of things, but ... I think we’ll ... 10 years from now, or maybe 15 years from now we’re going to look back and have a union in everything but name.

It is this philosophy of government which provides a theoretical foundation for those who advocate a North American Union, which will seek to impose such socialistic policies. Rather than American ideals of limited government leading the way, neo-socialist Red Tory ideals of social democracy will provide the building blocks of such a regional entity.

A Socialist North American Union

Aside from the near-socialistic policies revered by Segal and Bush masquerading as “conservatism,” avowed socialists, too, have been proponents of a North American Union (although, the fact that the NAU effort is being led by leftists masquerading as conservatives is deeply revealing, and serves to deceive the American people).

For instance, former Rep. David Bonior (D-Mich.) has been another leading advocate for the NAU, and his record shows his leftist tendencies. Bonior founded the American Rights at Work union advocacy group, and was honored by the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) in December 2008 for his policies. Unsurprisingly, he was also appointed to President Obama’s Economic Advisory Transition Team, and was previously a keynote speaker at DSA’s annual convention in 2003, where he spoke on the virtues and merits of a North American Parliamentary Union:

NAPU — short for North American Parliamentary Union — is an attempt to create a structure where there is wider participation in this decision-making. It would be a democratic structure to enfranchise all citizens in the NAFTA countries. A North America Parliament, with Mexico, Canada and the United States, with people — probably first appointed, but eventually elected like they are in the European Parliament — so we can begin to raise these issues of human rights, civil rights and labor rights and immigration, which never get talked about here.

Another prominent socialist advocate for the NAU is Stewart Alexander, former U.S. Socialist Party Vice Presidential candidate in 2008, who proposed a common U.S.-Mexican currency (i.e., the Amero that is being planned as a common currency for the North American Union, similar to the Euro), as well as a Basic Income Guarantee (BIG) for working people on both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border.

To accomplish his goal, Stewart Alexander says it will be necessary to restructure the entire banking industry: All banking and financial institutions would be socially owned, and operated by a North American Banking Authority that would be democratically controlled.

Yet another such advocate is former Mexican Secretary of Foreign Affairs Jorge Castaneda Gutman, previously a leader in the Mexican Communist Party. An advocate of social democracy, he who wrote the following glowing approbation for the NAU:

Well, my sense is that we’re moving closer and closer to forms of economic integration with the United States and Canada and conceivably Central America and Caribbean could become part of that in the coming years. I don’t see Mexico as a Latin American country. 

Too much of trade, investment, tourism, immigration, remittances, absolutely everything is concentrated exclusively with the United States. So, Mexico has to be part of a North American community, a North American union, which at some point probably should include some type of monetary union along European lines with a free flow of labor, with energy being on the table, etc.

Castaneda is also best known for his stealth work advocating the deceptive, nuanced principles of Eurocommunism as a means of accomplishing subtle, stealthy communist revolution. In his 1993 book Utopia Unarmed: The Latin American Left After the Cold War, Castaneda argues that in order for communism to succeed in the 21st century, it must shed its former image of street revolution and totalitarian violence in favor of more palatable mechanisms of communist change, including new social movements, transnational governments, elections, and the same principles identified by Segal, such as social democracy. Castaneda, incidentally, has co-authored several books with Professor Robert Pastor, who is considered the father of the North American Union.

Whether the NAU is publicly advocated by Republican neoconservatives or outright Democratic Socialists, history demonstrates that those who favor such transnational, regionalized governments are also advocates of an expansive government, the welfare state, and nationalized industry.

Interestingly, history demonstrates that regional governments along the lines of the North American Union, the African Union, and the European Union have been long-desired goals of the communists: If national borders are eradicated, and nations consolidated into continental blocs, than the goal of a one-world government is more easily attained. Morris Zeitlin, a writer for the Communist Party USA’s Daily World, observed in a 1975 editorial:

Planning is Socialism’s trademark. The USA has no regional government and no comprehensive regional planning to speak of. In socialist countries, metropolitan regions enjoy metropolitan regional government and comprehensive planning. The economic and functional efficiencies and the social benefits that comprehensive national, regional and city planning make possible in socialist society explain the Soviet Union’s enormous and rapid economic social progress.

Likewise, former Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev on March 23, 2000, in London, referred to the European Union (EU) as "the New European Soviet.” KGB defector Anatoliy Golitsyn, in his book New Lies for Old, revealed that the creation of a European Parliament would result in a neutered, socialist Europe, and former British intelligence officer Christopher Story properly identified the communizing aim of the European Union in his exposé, The European Union Collective: Enemy of Its Member States.

The North American Union would be yet another collective regional government, a new North American Soviet, that would clearly be the enemy of United States sovereignty. (NAU proponent Segal’s damning critique of the very foundations of the United States are a clear example of this phenomenon at play.)

Unsurprisingly, it is a coalition of overt socialists and leftists masquerading as conservatives that is leading the drive toward the North American Union, as evident in the latest push for continental integration being led by all shades of faux conservatives — the Red Tory “progressive conservative” Hugh Segal, moderate Republicans William Weld and Paul Cellucci, and “compassionate conservative” George W. Bush, all of whom are ideological peas in a pod.

Related article: Internationalists Renew Call for a North American Union

Source TNA

We have an Unlawful 14th Amendment

CAUTION: Do not use this irregularity to call for or support the Insiders call for a Constitutional Convention (CON-CON)!!

Posted on October 13, 2014 by admin in Education

There is No “Fourteenth Amendment”!

by David Lawrence, U.S. News & World Report, September 27, 1957

A MISTAKEN BELIEF—that there is a valid article in the Constitution known as the “Fourteenth Amendment”—is responsible for the Supreme Court decision of 1954 and the ensuing controversy over desegregation in the public schools of America. No such amendment was ever legally ratified by three fourths of the States of the Union as required by the Constitution itself. The so-called “Fourteenth Amendment” was dubiously proclaimed by the Secretary of State on July 20, 1868. The President shared that doubt. There were 37 States in the Union at the time, so ratification by at least 28 was necessary to make the amendment an integral part of the Constitution. Actually, only 21 States legally ratified it. So it failed of ratification.

The undisputed record, attested by official journals and the unanimous writings of historians, establishes these events as occurring in 1867 and 1868:

Outside the South, six States—New Jersey, Ohio, Kentucky, California, Delaware and Maryland—failed to ratify the proposed amendment.

In the South, ten States—Texas, Arkansas, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Florida, Mississippi and Louisiana —— by formal action of their legislatures, rejected it under the normal processes of civil law. A total of 16 legislatures out of 37 failed legally to ratify the “Fourteenth Amendment.”

Congress—which had deprived the Southern States of their seats in the Senate —did not lawfully pass the resolution of submission in the first instance.

The Southern States which had rejected the amendment were coerced by a federal statute passed in 1867 that took away the right to vote or hold office from all citizens who had served in the Confederate Army. Military governors were appointed and instructed to prepare the roll of voters. All this happened in spite of the presidential proclamation of amnesty previously issued by the President. New legislatures were thereupon chosen and forced to “ratify” under penalty of continued exile from the Union. In Louisiana, a General sent down from the North presided over the State legislature.

Abraham Lincoln had declared many times that the Union was “inseparable” and “indivisible.” After his death, and when the war was over, the ratification by the Southern States of the Thirteenth Amendment, abolishing slavery, had been accepted as legal. But Congress in the 1867 law imposed the specific conditions under which the Southern States would be “entitled to representation in Congress.”

Congress, in passing the 1867 law that declared the Southern States could not have their seats in either the Senate or House in the next session unless they ratified the “Fourteenth Amendment,” took an unprecedented step. No such right—to compel a State by an act of Congress to ratify a constitutional amendment—is to be found anywhere in the Constitution.

Nor has this procedure ever been sanctioned by the Supreme Court of the United States. President Andrew Johnson publicly denounced this law as unconstitutional. But it was passed over his veto.
Secretary of State Seward was on the spot in July 1868 when the various “ratifications” of a spurious nature were placed before him. 

The legislatures of Ohio and New Jersey had notified him that they rescinded their earlier action of ratification. He said in his official proclamation that he was not authorized as Secretary of State “to determine and decide doubtful questions as to the authenticity of the organization of State legislatures or as to the power of any State legislature to recall a previous act or resolution of ratification.” He added that the amendment was valid “if the resolutions of the legislatures of Ohio and New Jersey, ratifying the aforesaid amendment, are to be deemed as remaining of full force and effect, notwithstanding the subsequent resolutions of the legislatures of these States.” This was a very big “if.” It will be noted that the real issue, therefore, is not only whether the forced “ratification” by the ten Southern States was lawful, but whether the withdrawal by the legislatures of Ohio and New Jersey —two Northern States —was legal. The right of a State, by action of its legislature, to change its mind at any time before the final proclamation of ratification is issued by the Secretary of State has been confirmed in connection with other constitutional amendments.

The Oregon Legislature in October 1868 —three months after the Secretary’s proclamation was issued —passed a rescinding resolution, which argued that the “Fourteenth Amendment” had not been ratified by three fourths of the States and that the “ratifications” in the Southern States were “usurpations, unconstitutional, revolutionary and void” and that, “until such ratification is completed, any State has a right to withdraw its assent to any proposed amendment.”

What do the historians say about all this? The Encyclopedia Americana states:
“Reconstruction added humiliation to suffering . . . Eight years of crime, fraud, and corruption followed and it was State legislatures composed of Negroes, carpetbaggers and scalawags who obeyed the orders of the generals and ratified the amendment.”

W. E. Woodward, in his famous work, “A New American History?” published in 1936, says:
“To get a clear idea of the succession of events let us review [President Andrew] Johnson’s actions in respect to the ex-Confederate States.”

“In May, 1865, he issued a Proclamation of Amnesty to former rebels. Then he established provisional governments in all the Southern States. They were instructed to call Constitutional Conventions. They did. New State governments were elected. White men only had the suffrage [the Fifteenth Amendment establishing equal voting rights had not yet been passed]. Senators and Representatives were chosen, but when they appeared at the opening of Congress they were refused admission. The State governments, however, continued to function during 1866.”

“Now we are in 1867. In the early days of that year [Thaddeus] Stevens brought in, as chairman of the House Reconstruction Committee, a bill that proposed to sweep all the Southern State governments into the wastebasket. The South was to be put under military rule.”

“The bill passed. It was vetoed by Johnson and passed again over his veto. In the Senate it was amended in such fashion that any State could escape from military rule and be restored to its full rights by ratifying the Fourteenth Amendment and admitting black as well as white men to the polls.” In challenging its constitutionality, President Andrew Johnson said in his veto message:

“I submit to Congress whether this measure is not in its whole character, scope and object without precedent and without authority, in palpable conflict with the plainest provisions of the Constitution, and utterly destructive of those great principles of liberty and humanity for which our ancestors on both sides of the Atlantic have shed so much blood and expended so much treasure.”

Many historians have applauded Johnson’s words. Samuel Eliot Morison and Henry Steele Commager, known today as “liberals,” wrote in their book, “The Growth of the American Republic”:

“Johnson returned the bill with a scorching message arguing the unconstitutionality of the whole thing, and most impartial students have agreed with his reasoning.”

James Truslow Adams, another noted historian, writes in his “History of the United States”:

“The Supreme Court had decided three months earlier, in the Milligan case, . . . that military courts were unconstitutional except under such war conditions as might make the operation of civil courts impossible, but the President pointed out in vain that practically the whole of the new legislation was unconstitutional. . . . There was even talk in Congress of impeaching the Supreme Court for its decisions! The legislature had run amok and was threatening both the Executive and the Judiciary.”

Actually, President Johnson was impeached, but the move failed by one vote in the Senate.

The Supreme Court, in case after case, refused to pass on the illegal activities involved in “ratification.” It said simply that they were acts of the “political departments of the Government.” This, of course, was a convenient device of avoidance. The Court has adhered to that position ever since Reconstruction Days.

Andrew C. McLaughlin, whose “Constitutional History of the United States” is a standard work, writes:

“Can a State which is not a State and not recognized as such by Congress, perform the supreme duty of ratifying an amendment to the fundamental law? Or does a State —by congressional thinking —cease to be a State for some purposes but not for others?”

This is the tragic history of the so-called “Fourteenth Amendment”— a record that is a disgrace to free government and a “government of law.”

Isn’t the use of military force to override local government what we deplored in Hungary? It is never too late to correct injustice. The people of America should have an opportunity to pass on an amendment to the Constitution that sets forth the right of the Federal Government to control education and regulate attendance at public schools either with federal power alone or concurrently with the States.

That’s the honest way, the just way to deal with the problem of segregation or integration in the schools. Until such an amendment is adopted, the “Fourteenth Amendment” should be considered as null and void.

There is only one supreme tribunal — it is the people themselves. Their sovereign will is expressed through the procedures set forth in the Constitution itself.

via dueprocessrevisited

The Importance of Understanding the U.S. Constitution *8min. video*

Only you know if you're a true Americanist yourself and support & defend our Constitution as you demand from our leaders. We must live it, and not just talk the talk. Right?

Published on Oct 6, 2014

JBS CEO Art Thompson's weekly news video update for Oct. 6 - 12, 2014.

In this week's analysis behind the news video, JBS CEO Art Thompson discusses how we all need to understand the Constitution; how officeholders and military personnel take an oath to support the Constitution; how such oath takers really ought to know what the Constitution says and means; how there is a problem with how the Constitution is taught in the schools, as for example the Second Amendment; how there is a movement to change the Constitution through a constitutional convention or convention of the states, such as altering the Second Amendment to restrict our right to keep and bear arms; how conservatives that are working to alter the Constitution for conservative purposes by means of an Article V convention are working together with those who want to alter the Second Amendment to get such a convention called; how the Obama administration is toying with limiting free speech by enforcing political correctness by means of fines for using the Washington Redskins team name during broadcasts; and how we need to study the Constitution, such as viewing the JBS set of DVDs, The Constitution Is the Solution.

To order The Constitution Is the Solution set of DVDs, go to:
https://www.jbs.org/webstore/shop-jbs...

Republicans and Democrats Working Together to Rewrite the Constitution

When you find the rule book that you knew before you got in the game is too 'restricting' to your own personal welfare, well what does one do? Well, being Me Firsters they change the rules in the book, you dummy. Many of you will be shocked that this step in your betrayal for a "Constitutional Convention" originates within your own state legislatures! "Honey, I'm home."

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Tuesday, 09 September 2014 12:51

Written by  Christian Gomez

Many conservative Americans who support a modern-day constitutional convention, a.k.a. a "Convention of the States," sincerely believe that the states will be able to control what happens should such a convention be convened and that the agenda would be limited to a predetermined "conservative" agenda, such as balancing the federal budget. Yet the evidence continues to mount that this is mere wishful thinking. As a little-publicized meeting late this spring clearly demonstrated, conservative state legislators who fashion themselves the founding fathers of a new convention recognize that they must make their "tent" big enough to include liberal Democrats in order to succeed.

On June 12-13, 2014, the Indiana State Legislature hosted what its organizers termed a "write the rules convention," composed of both Republicans and progressive Democrats, to prepare for a future Article V "convention of the states."

This "rules convention" was the product of the Assembly of State Legislatures (ASL), which describes itself as "a bipartisan group of currently serving state legislators from across the country who recognize that the states have a responsibility under federalism to work together to solve problems of national concern."

Formerly known as the Mount Vernon Assembly and renamed at the June meeting, ASL appears to be the brainchild of Republican State Representative Chris Kapenga of Wisconsin. Both Kapenga's and ASL's desired goal is to bring about an amendments convention as provided for in the Constitution's Article V: "The Congress … on the application of the legislatures of two thirds of the several states, shall call a convention for proposing amendments, which, in either case, shall be valid to all intents and purposes, as part of this Constitution, when ratified by the legislatures of three fourths of the several states, or by conventions in three fourths thereof, as the one or the other mode of ratification may be proposed by the Congress." (Emphasis added.)

Said and Unsaid

The June 12 ASL session opened with prayer and pledge in the House of Representatives Chamber of the Indiana Statehouse, followed by elaboration by Kapenga on some of the background of Article V and how the states can utilize it to amend the Constitution. Asserting that this would be a purely state-led and state-directed process, Kapenga proceeded to quote from Alexander Hamilton's The Federalist, No. 85, which addresses Article V: "The words of this article are peremptory. The Congress 'shall call a convention.' Nothing in this particular is left to the discretion of that body."

Since "The Federalist Papers are not [the] governing documents of our country," as Democratic State Representative Raymond Dehn of Minnesota pointed out, Kapenga and other pro Article V convention advocates cannot use the above quote from Hamilton to definitively lay to rest any concerns or fears of potential congressional involvement and influence over an actual Article V convention.

Article I, Section 8, Clause 18 of the Constitution, which unlike the Federalist Papers is the nation's primary governing document, specifically states: "The Congress shall have Power … To make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this Constitution in the government of the United States, or in any department or office thereof." (Emphasis added.)

Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution lists the various powers specifically granted to Congress, among which are the power to "establish Post Offices and post Roads," "declare war," and "provide and maintain a Navy." Regarding the latter, since Congress has the power to "provide and maintain a Navy," Article I, Section 8, Clause 18 grants Congress the power to do what is "necessary and proper" to exercise this power ­— meaning the establishment of naval academies to train officers and sailors; the creation of shipyards to construct, refit, and repair warships; and the hiring and training of engineers to build, design, and operate those vessels. Clause 18 is not limited to only those "foregoing powers" listed in Article I, Section 8, but to "all other powers vested by this Constitution," including Article V.

This means that under Article I, Section 8, Clause 18 Congress is granted the power to "make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution" Article V's constitutional mandate that Congress, "on the Application of the Legislatures of two thirds of the several States, shall call a Convention for proposing Amendments." 

Constitutionally, Congress has and will execute all the powers it deems necessary for calling a convention. This would likely include choosing the location and date of the convention, allocation of delegates from the states (whether proportional by population, congressional district, one per state, etc.), the method of ratification for any proposed amendments to the Constitution, and all other preliminary rules associated with the convention.

Put simply, the power to establish such rules resides exclusively with Congress. It is not a state-led process as Kapenga and others in the pro-Article V camp maintain.

Of course, once an Article V convention actually convenes, it would then be free to create its own agenda, including possibly even coming up with a new ratification process, as was the case with the Constitutional Convention of 1787. But this historical fact underscores even more the fact that the states cannot bind the work of the convention.

Speaking about the nature and purpose of the two-day Indianapolis meeting, Kapenga told the state legislators in attendance that their current assembly meeting "does not trigger Article V authority or involvement of Congress, because remember the Article V authority is to amend." 

Kapenga continued, "We are not touching amendments at this convention. This is a write the rules convention." (Emphasis added.)

Kapenga and the other state legislators behind the ASL view their two-day gathering in Indianapolis as already being a "new legislative body" or "convention," the same type of convention as an Article V convention, which they claim is not a one-time meeting but an ongoing assembly or continuous series of "Conventions of the States."

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