Maybe a balanced budget except during an emergency declared by a supermajority or something…
(Of course that makes me picture the US being bombed by China and some minority of congress holding back for maximum pork.)
Then how about an amendment that requires proposed legislation to always be single purpose and always be fully read in session and be fully made public for a minimum time before it can be voted on? No more of that “and other purposes” crap.
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That was about the best I could get, too.
I am not sure the ruling itself was a mistake…in a functioning system if Trump does something wrong he is either impeached or becomes so unpopular that his office is no longer relevant for the remainder of his term. Our actual problem is that not enough people thought his actions were disqualifying. That is an information problem more than anything else (or perhaps we all have incorrectly biased views).
Oh, plenty of people who voted for him (or stayed home) thought this.
But, he’s not a woman, so…
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That would help. Even still there’s so many unofficial shenanigans and politics surrounding every vote, particularly in our current environment of making everything D v R.
My plan is to increase the Senators to 3 per state: one in every class in every state.
Increase the House to 650 to keep the balance roughly equal. There are 803 electoral votes, with 402 needed to win. No possibility of a 50-50 tie.
Proportional allocation of votes would be good.
You’re still not going to have perfectly even allocation of Representatives but it’ll be a little smoother than it is today, and each district will be significantly smaller, bringing reps a little closer to their constituents.
I don’t see any particular value in that. Yes, each rep represents fewer people, also each rep has less clout in DC. As a voter, whatever I gained attention from my rep is lost by the fact that the rep can’t do as much.
My state legislature districts are far, far smaller than my federal house district. I don’t feel that I have some personal connection to my state reps as a result.
650 House + 150 Senate = 800 votes before DC, which would possibly get 4 instead of 3 from the expansion, so 804 total and 403 to win.
Cube Root Law gives 693 House (slowly growing every decade) + 150 Senate + 4 DC = 847 total and 424 to win.
Math is hard. Post corrected.
IIRC, one requirement for eligibility to vote was to own (land) property.
I doubt they were worried about the “stupidity of the voter” so much as that many of the agrarian-focused powers were worried about the impact of a direct popular vote would give too much sway to urban concerns.
As for the number of Representatives sent to the House by a given state . . . I wonder how things would look if we started with a “top-down” approach. Namely, the most populous state gets, say, 60 representatives. Break that down to the average constituents per rep and apply that to other states.
There is limited space in the House (I think this is why we’re in the position we are today).
By coincidence, two Senators, Welch and Manchin, introduced a bill for an amendment on Supreme Court term limits.
It appears to have the features I mentioned in an earlier post. 18 year, non-renewable, staggered terms beginning on July 1 of even numbered years. Justices who leave early are replaced by short termers who also have non-renewable terms.
I don’t know why they would do this deep in a lame duck session, maybe Manchin wanted to do it on his way out.
I’m open to an amendment on SCOTUS term limits, but I do think it should also set the size of the court so it can’t be changed to pack the court.
That is Section 1 in the Welch/Manchin proposed amendment.
How about something really radical like giving a state the right to secede and setting out the process it has to follow. For example, 60% of the state’s voters agreeing to it combined with 60% Senate approval. Surely secession should be permitted in a true democracy.
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This is not really farfetched given the widening political divide.
We are a conservative nation at heart. The Constitution has increasingly been viewed as almost biblical in status so it may be political suicide to try to make any future substantive amendments to it. It is easier just to leave it as is so that is what we will do.
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You’d have to spell out provisions for
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how much of the national debt they are taking with them
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what rights they have to military bases and military equipment / property in the state
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what rights they have to other federal property & equipment in the state
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what rights active duty military have… they can presumably move and stay in the military… what if they don’t want to move?
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who pays for military & federal government pensions of residents arising from service prior to the split
Probably TONS more but those are some that immediately spring to mind
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Oh crap, so it’s like an employer withdrawing from a multiemployer pension plan on steroids.
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Wouldn’t the same question apply to Social Security and Medicare?