I suggest a couple of amendments to the Constitution, based on yesterday’s ruling, over at PJMedia.
11 thoughts on “A Modest Proposal”
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I suggest a couple of amendments to the Constitution, based on yesterday’s ruling, over at PJMedia.
Comments are closed.
I agree with the comment over there: Even Prohibition, probably the worst Constitutional Amendment ever written, took about 12 years to repeal.
And that was removing something that was already there. I think creating something new would take longer.
After pondering this for the last 24 hours, I’m inclined to discount the opinion that Roberts is “crazy like a fox”. He could have accomplished the same, or more, foundational damage to CC overreach while also throwing out the law. And the resulting arguments for judicial non-partisanship would still exist. They would instead take the form: “Even Kennedy, who is usually a moderate voice, found Obamacare to be wrong in it’s entirety.”
Roberts is being lauded for his statement: “It is not our job to protect the people from the consequences of their political choices.” But he has chosen this decision to communicate that. A decision that he alone created. And one which can be fairly condensed to: “The government didn’t mean what it said.” And we’re supposed to conclude that our political choices have consequences? I’m not as smart as he is, but that record-needle screech is pretty loud.
Especially considering that the rhetoric about the Commerce Clause in his ruling has no legal impact.
It was dicta. Nothing requires the other Justices to consider it in future cases.
Yep. Here’s Mark Levin:
If five justices had intended for their view of the commerce clause to be controlling as the majority view of the court, they would have said so by joining or concurring in each others’ parts. They didn’t. There was no formal majority on the commerce clause issue. Should this matter come before a court again, it is not settled as a matter of precedent and no doubt the litigants will still be fighting over it.
First, I just read your PJM article. Perhaps because I’ve read you previously for so long, I had the same thoughts as presented on the first page as I cogitated about the decision last night. I’m not sure what Roberts was thinking, particularly in light of some of the stuff Eugene Volokh identified. But Roberts certainly pointed to the appropriate remedy, in the short and long term.
As for your amendments in wording, and myself not being a lawyer, you asked about clarity.
Amendment 1: “legitimate government purposes” is a rather broad area that can be defined to mean almost anything. I do like the issue of coercion, but then all taxes are coercive in some manner. It is amazing that to prohibit alcohol, the US government required a constitutional amendment, but to prohibit cigarettes and drugs, the US government required much simpler devices. Smoking, though banned many places, has become very much a rarity because of excessive taxes (though mostly imposed at the state and municiple levels). I’m sure Dems will try for a carbon tax again in the future, because nothings says serfdom like taxing your citizens breathing.
Amendment 2: I only disagree with “does not comply with Congressional dictates.” It fails in the negative. Let’s say Congress levies a tax to pay for defense. The nutty folks in Oregon say, “we won’t allow federal military bases on our soil”. Ok, fine, they don’t comply with Congressional dictates. At that point, I think the US government should withhold the revenue raised to pay for taxes from Oregon. Then again, it would require amendment 1 to be written well to help identify revenue raised for a certain purpose that then could be denied.
Note, another mistake of referencing a co-blogger site. David Bernstein noted the descrepancies at Volokh.com.
My changes to the Constitution would be in from of:
All laws sunset in 5 years unless passed by super majority in both houses.
Congress shal be subject to all laws it passes with explicit doubling of all penalties.
Before a congressman or senator can vote yes on a bill he must have read it in its entirety.
All bills shal have a single purpose and be less than 3 pages in length.
I do like these amendments better. The second one should get universal bipartisan support from all voters.
On a more expeditious note; GOP is promising to put up a vote for repeal on July 9th. I suggest another modest proposal.
Obama then and now, with aid from his surrogates, is still claiming that the mandate isn’t a tax but a penalty. Alright then, add an amendment to Obamacare that explicitly claims the revenue collected is not a tax and that neither Congress nor the Presidency considers the mandate a tax. Then pass that amendment, make the President and Senate Democrats own this claim. Afterwards, the states can refile their papers with SCOTUS.
Leland: “Make them own this claim.”
This.
This is the best specific proposal at any level I’ve heard.
So many proposed remedies are broad, even grandiose. This one is tight and focused, and avoids tampering with the Constitution.
I propose naming it the “Nail Us to the Wall” act.
Your first amendment would make the introduction of trade tariffs illegal. I doubt it would pass. They have been used since the time of Alexander Hamilton. Amazingly Obamacare would probably still pass under it since you are not buying a product but a service…
The second should be marvelous in helping to curb the state deficit spiral. Not.
1) All bills must contain only one subject defined by the title of the bill.
That is, a “Transportation Bill of 2012” must stay focused on “Transportation”. Stop with the “Energy Bills” that require new Sea Wolf class submarines to include baby grand pianos “for enhancing the culture”.
2) The constitutionally required budget shall be a single 8.5 x 11 sheet of paper indicating the allocation of funds already available for the next year between -each- cabinet-level department, congress and the courts. Any further “emergency” spending needs to be brought up as a separate bill focusing on just that one department. Failure to pass a budget revokes all pay, perks and benefits from both Congress and the Presidency.
This is the “Stop micromanaging crap you don’t understand” amendment. And “Pass something dammit.”
3) Only confirmed and sworn in official cabinet members get to submit the regulations for their department for consideration. They get 1000 pages of 8.5 x 11 @ 10 point Times New Roman in which to write their regulations. They sunset yearly, and thus must be voted on in Congress yearly. The text must be made available freely, electronically, and anonymously to all askers.
There should also be one about making future pensions/retirements “defined contributions” with the contributions always taking place in the -current- fiscal year, but the proper wording seems trickier.