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The United States’ Unamendable Constitution

newyorker.com

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Re: The United States’ Unamendable Constitution

#221

Post by ralph84 »

crazygringo wrote: post #189
WalterBright wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US Constitution is still the best one in the world. The 18th Amendment (Prohibition) is an example of what can go wrong with amendments.

Actually it's not. Constitution design is an academic field, a very niche area of political science, and nobody would ever implement anything like the US Constitution today. It would be like using ALGOL for a new project today instead of Python or Java. The US Constitution was very much a version 1.0 project, written before people even knew political parties would be a design constraint. Constitutions are on like ver…

If the newer versions are better why do they end up being so short-lived?

Re: The United States’ Unamendable Constitution

#222

Post by cm2187 »

Author complains these amendments cannot be passed because of political polarisation. That polarisation is the very reason why those amendments shouldn't pass. You can only change the constitution if there is a consensus, by design. If you want to make a change that half the country is dead against, all the systems of balance of power will work against it (two chambers - one by headcount the other by states, filibuster, presidential veto, high threshold of consensus for changing the constitution), as it should. And the constitution should be the hardest of all paths, since it is senior to all others.

Re: The United States’ Unamendable Constitution

#223

Post by lmm »

WalterBright wrote: post #174
tptacek wrote: post #33

It's an interesting article and if you bounced off it because you had a visceral reaction to the premise, like I did at first, I'd recommend taking another whack at it. Jill Lepore, if you're not familiar with her work, is a historian with a reputation as a more rigorous version of people like Howard Zinn. I don't think it's a good article though. In particular, I don't think it coheres. It's about how the modern Con…

The US Constitution is still the best one in the world. The 18th Amendment (Prohibition) is an example of what can go wrong with amendments.

How many constitutions have you lived under for a substantial length of time to come to that judgement?

Re: The United States’ Unamendable Constitution

#224

Post by lupire »

johnnyanmac wrote: post #191
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's a statement about each party's (dis)satisfaction with the current success of their party. This requires clarification. If our government was elected based on a "one person one vote" principle, Republicans would be nearly guaranteed to lose the presidency and Congress. Since 1992 there have been 8 presidential elections. Republicans only won the popular vote once (2004) but also won the presidency in 2000 and 2…

>The fact is that our Constitution reduces voting rights for those that live in populous urban areas and gives outsized voting rights to those that live in rural/sparsely populated area yup, that was by intention. That's also exactly why the senate was erected; they didn't want smaller states to be ignored by campaigns that could ultimately just focus on enough electoral votes to win the election. >This rationale/com…

No, it was because the slave states didn't want to lose slavery in a Senate vote.

If you think CA is too populous for it's people deserve an equal vote, CA should be 6 states. But the slavers fought that too (Missouri Compromise).

State boundaries are legal constructs inherited from obsolete aristocracy, not meaningful cultural boundaries.

It makes no sense to solve a hypothetical tyranny of large states by replacing it with an actual tyranny of small states. The Constitution is We the People, not the We the States.

Re: The United States’ Unamendable Constitution

#225

Post by ijidak »

ijidak wrote: post #50
johnthuss wrote: post #15

"Seventy-two per cent of Republicans think that the Constitution is basically fine as is; seventy-two per cent of Democrats disagree." Of course this has nothing to do the actual Constitution. It's a statement about each party's (dis)satisfaction with the current success of their party. The optimist in me wants to believe that even in this polarized culture politicians could compromise and find a middle ground on man…

Unfortunately, this tendency away from collaboration agreement has been trending this direction for the last hundred or so years. "But know this, that in the last days critical times hard to deal with will be here...For men will be...not open to any agreement" Wouldn't hold my breath on this improving. To the contrary .. It's going to continue to get worse.

Meant to say *collaborative agreement

Re: The United States’ Unamendable Constitution

#226

Post by selimthegrim »

WalterBright wrote: post #180
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's a statement about each party's (dis)satisfaction with the current success of their party. This requires clarification. If our government was elected based on a "one person one vote" principle, Republicans would be nearly guaranteed to lose the presidency and Congress. Since 1992 there have been 8 presidential elections. Republicans only won the popular vote once (2004) but also won the presidency in 2000 and 2…

The answer is, it is a Republic, not a Democracy. It's set up to make it difficult for the majority to trample on the rights of the minority. More colorfully, having two wolves and a sheep vote on what's for dinner. It's still a good thing.

You need to look up the Dorr rebellion and the Guarantee Clause in the Constitution before you use that line again.

Was Morgan Kousser teaching at Tech when you were there?

Re: The United States’ Unamendable Constitution

#227

Post by crazygringo »

PinesOfRome wrote: post #208
crazygringo wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually it's not. Constitution design is an academic field, a very niche area of political science, and nobody would ever implement anything like the US Constitution today. It would be like using ALGOL for a new project today instead of Python or Java. The US Constitution was very much a version 1.0 project, written before people even knew political parties would be a design constraint. Constitutions are on like ver…

Elaborate on this. How do political parties affect the equation here, and what would the more modern approach be? Any texts you can recommend regarding this?

Well, checks and balances in the American constitution were founded on the idea that there would be no "factions" (parties), and so the three branches (legislative, executive, judicial) would balance each other without any single group ever taking over. In reality, when Democrats or Republicans capture all 3 branches, it utterly defeats the entire premise of the Constitution.

The modern approach is generally a parliamentary system rather than a presidential system, and multiparty proportional representation (sometimes with multi-member districts) rather than two-party first-past-the-post single member districts. Some places to start:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parliamentary_system

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proportional_representation

If you want to look at more "advanced" constitional forms, then consociationalism is a good place to start, although much less widely adopted and more controversial as to whether it's progress or not:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consociationalism

Re: The United States’ Unamendable Constitution

#228

Post by m-p-3 »

cm2187 wrote: post #222

Author complains these amendments cannot be passed because of political polarisation. That polarisation is the very reason why those amendments shouldn't pass. You can only change the constitution if there is a consensus, by design. If you want to make a change that half the country is dead against, all the systems of balance of power will work against it (two chambers - one by headcount the other by states, filibust…

So one way or another, the population will reach its breaking point, and the Constitution will change.

Re: The United States’ Unamendable Constitution

#229

Post by anonymousiam »

cm2187 wrote: post #222

Author complains these amendments cannot be passed because of political polarisation. That polarisation is the very reason why those amendments shouldn't pass. You can only change the constitution if there is a consensus, by design. If you want to make a change that half the country is dead against, all the systems of balance of power will work against it (two chambers - one by headcount the other by states, filibust…

Exactly! In addition, the 10th amendment should prevent, but has not stopped Congress from passing most of the laws it has passed.

https://constitution.congress.gov/constitution/amendment-10/

Re: The United States’ Unamendable Constitution

#230

Post by selimthegrim »

Georgelemental wrote: post #183
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's a statement about each party's (dis)satisfaction with the current success of their party. This requires clarification. If our government was elected based on a "one person one vote" principle, Republicans would be nearly guaranteed to lose the presidency and Congress. Since 1992 there have been 8 presidential elections. Republicans only won the popular vote once (2004) but also won the presidency in 2000 and 2…

> the equal-number-of-senators-per-state is the one thing that the Constitution explicitly forbids changing by amendment, the last clause of Article V. Nit: "no State, without its Consent, shall be deprived of its equal Suffrage in the Senate."

Does this impact the part of 14th amendment that reduces representation for noncompliance after readmission?
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