Jane Addams
UNICAMERAL LEGISLATURES
AN AMENDMENT MAKING IT CLEAR THAT CORPORATIONS ARE NOT PEOPLE
VETO OVERRIDES BY A SIMPLE MAJORITY
GIVE THE REPRESENTATIVE ASSEMBLIES (NOT PRESIDENTS OR GOVERNORS) THE POWER TO ISSUE PARDONS
MODIFY JUDICIAL REVIEW
THE DETAILS OF CONDUCTING AN ARTICLE V CONVENTION
REPEAL THE UNIFORM CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICT ACT
CONDUCT BUSINESS DEMOCRATICALLY IN REPRESENTATIVE ASSEMBLIES
The U. S. Senate was designed to be an "elite" assembly (originally elected by state legislatures instead of directly by the people) to give the wealthy a check on the will of the people. In a true democracy, absent a desire to check or limit the will of the people, there is really no reason to have a bicameral (two chamber) legislature. Nebraska implemented a unicameral in 1937 through a statewide referendum. It has proven to be more efficient and saved the taxpayers a lot of money. We should make Congress and the legislatures in the other 49 states unicameral legislatures.
Most of the other democracies that have moved from a bicameral to a unicameral legislature have simply abolished their upper chambers. The primary obstacle to abolishing the U. S. Senate is that the normal amendment process would require a two-thirds super-majority in the Senate to propose the amendment that would abolish the Senate (and do away with the lucrative and prestigious positions to which they have been elected). A constitutional convention is, at present, the only other way to enact any amendment abolishing the Senate or merging it with the House.
A proposal to merge the House and Senate might get more support in the Senate if we retain the concept (and titles) of both senator and representative with senators having more power than representatives. That could be accomplished through a system of proxies for citizens, with the members of Congress who have been assigned the most proxies nationwide holding the office of senator and the members who hold the most proxies in each congressional district serving as representatives.
If we do not move to a unicameral Congress, we will need to find some other way to democratize the U. S. Senate.
The U. S. Senate is, in and of itself, the most undemocratic element in the form of our government, with equal representation for states resulting in grossly unequal representation for the people of the larger states. Equal representation for the states in the Senate was “The Great Compromise” between the larger, more populous states (that wanted representation to be based on population) and the smaller states (that wanted to retain the equal representation for each state that they enjoyed under the Articles of Confederation). It was an unfortunate compromise, made necessary because the small states threatened to leave the convention (and the union) if they were denied equal suffrage in one house of Congress.
At a minimum, we need to extend a system of Proxies for Citizens to the Senate. That would make both the House of Representatives and the Senate considerably more reflective of the will of the people, which would presumably put an end to endless gridlock. It would also introduce an unnecessary redundancy. That might be necessary at least temporarily to get the necessary amendment enacted.
Abolishing the Senate, merging it with the U. S. House of Representatives to make Congress a unicameral legislature, or implementing a system of proxies in the Senate will require a constitutional amendment.
Amendments merging the Senate with the House of Representatives should be adopted in state governments. The primary reason we have a Senate at the federal level was to appease the small states at the Federal Convention of 1787. Our legislatures are also modeled on Great Britain's. We don't need a Senate to block the will of the people. We need a Congress and state legislatures that reflect the will of the people.
Corporations are not mentioned anywhere in the Constitution. Corporations are not people. They are a form of business organization. The fact that five misguided, dark-robed Supreme Court Justices declared that corporations are people, with the same natural rights as human beings, does not make it so. The corporate form of business organization enables companies to reap enormous profits, grow very large, and become very powerful. We must prevent that power from being used to take control of our government.
[A joint resolution (H.J. Res. 54) has been introduced in the U. S. House of Representatives by Representative Pramila Jayapal. It currently has 75 cosponsors.
Allowing one person (a president or a governor) to negate the votes of a sizable majority of the members of Congress or a state legislature if support for a bill falls even one vote short of a super-majority in either the House or the Senate is extremely undemocratic. It borders on autocracy.
A president or governor should be able to review legislation that has been enacted by the legislature, to share his or her concerns, and encourage them to reconsider. If we continue to allow a president or governor to veto legislation, to be consistent with the principle of majority rule, the legislature should be able to override a veto by a simple majority.
In a democracy, the power to veto legislation is properly vested in the people. Whenever it appears likely that Congress or a state legislature has enacted legislation that does not have the support of a majority of the people, whether or not a president or governor has vetoed it, veto referendums, with every voter having a single vote, and the votes of a simple majority deciding whether legislation is approved or rejected should be conducted. And calling veto referendums should be a simple and relatively easy process.
Allowing one person to set aside convictions for crimes is a formula for corruption, placing too much power in a single person. Lord Acton's assertion that "Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely" has been proven true over time.
The House of Representatives (both in Congress and in state legislatures) should have the power to grant pardons or commute sentences, by majority vote. (Ideally, within a system that includes Proxies for Citizens.)
The power of the Supreme Court to nullify acts of Congress that have been signed into law by the president is not included in the Constitution. The power of "Judicial Review" is a power the Supreme Court gave itself early in our nation's history. Allowing a handful of Supreme Court Justices to unilaterally "veto" legislation through "Judicial Review" makes the judicial branch supreme rather than the legislative power.
The Supreme Court of the United States and the Supreme Courts in the states should have the power to notify representative assemblies of their opinion with regard to legislation being "unconstitutional" and offer suggestions for how to address their concerns. Representative assemblies should have the option of addressing or ignoring those concerns by a majority vote of the members.
Article V of the U. S. Constitution includes a provision for amendments to be proposed by means of a constitutional convention to be convened “on the Application of the Legislatures of two thirds of the several States” but does not include any details regarding how delegates to that convention would be chosen or how the business of the convention is to be conducted. If an Article V Convention is called without those details already in place, it will precipitate an unnecessary and avoidable constitutional crisis.
Several separate campaigns are actively seeking to call a convention, each of them calling for competing limitations on the amendments that can be proposed or considered at a convention. Twenty-eight states have adopted resolutions calling for a convention. That is only six short of the number required. It is not clear if Congress is required to call a convention if there are different limitations in some of the resolutions or if states legislatures have the power to set limits on the amendments that can be proposed the delegates to an Article V Convention.
The delegates to the Federal Convention of 1787, immediately upon convening, decided to disregard the language in the resolution that called the convention limiting them to do proposing nothing more than revisions to the Articles of Confederation. The delegates to an Article V Convention could presumably do the same thing.
Our greatest blessing, as Americans, is that we can change the form of our government peacefully, using ballots instead of bullets. (Although the amendment process is among the most anti-democratic provisions in our Constitution.). An Article V Convention is likely to be the best means of enacting the amendments needed to remove the other anti-democratic provisions from our Constitution. Absent legislation detailing a democratic process for electing delegates and conducting the business of the convention, there is good reason to fear an Article V Convention. With a democratic process in place, there would be good reason to celebrate a convention.
The Uniform Congressional District Act requires that all members of the U. S. House of Representatives be elected from single-member districts. Repealing this act will enable states to neutralize the effects of gerrymandering and give voters more choices regarding who will represent them in Congress by electing representatives at-large or from multi-member districts using ranked choice voting.
Rules and established practices in both houses of Congress and state legislatures empower minorities and, in some cases, even individual members to block action on legislation.
The filibuster is the most notorious example. Requiring a super-majority of 60 votes in the U. S. Senate to even discuss or debate, let alone pass, legislation has been one of the primary reasons that critical problems and issues are rarely addressed by Congress. Getting rid of the filibuster requires nothing more than electing senators who believe in majority rule (democracy) to a majority in the U. S. Senate.
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The material on this website is adapted from a soon to be published book: Government by the People: A Citizen's Guide to Making America a Perfect Democracy by Winston Apple.
Content is Copyright 2024 Gary Winston Apple, unless otherwise noted..
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