Prof. Sabato: American consitution needs update

[MarkWarner08]

http://politicalbooks.com/2007/09/a_radical_overhaul_of_the_us_c.html

Looks to be quite a thought-provoking book.  I hope he supports a single term limit for Presidents. A six year Presidency would force the Commander in Chief to work with the opposition party on issues of import to him. If the President didn't work with Congress, he'd be a lame duck from day one. Such a move would also weaken the power of the executive branch, something that would please many of the founding fathers.

[afleitch]

Unfortunately any consitutional 'update' would allow those who shout the loudest (particularly those who believe any political recipe needs 'some more Jay-sus'  to change things in their favour. I don't think theres anything wrong with the current constitution.

[minionofmidas]

Are you serious?

[7,052,770]

http://amoreperfectconstitution.com/23_proposals.htm

Here are the 23 proposals.

[Lief 🗽]

I agree that the Constitution needs to be drastically updated. It was written in an age before electricity, modern medicine, the internet, mass production, industrialization, automobiles, airplanes, televisions, etc. There are many anachronistic parts of the constitution that no longer really apply to life today.

EDIT:
However, most of his ideas are horrible.

[Frodo]

As much as I admire Larry Sabato's talents as a pollster, I think he is dead wrong in this instance. 

There is nothing wrong with the Constitution as it is currently written, and no update is needed or desired, especially in this era of hyper-partisanship and ideological polarization in which one faction or the other will use any excuse to one-up the other should any constitutional convention be held. 

What is desperately needed, however, is better civic education of the American people regarding the Constitution and the Federalist Papers. 

[Joe Kakistocracy]

What is desperately needed, however, is better civic education of the American people regarding the Constitution and the Federalist Papers. 

I completely agree, and I believe that civic education ought to start with members of Congress and the Administration.

[Lief 🗽]

Yes, our civic education is severely, severely lacking. In Texas, you take a semester of Government in Senior year and hope that your teacher covers the Federalist papers, the founding of the constitution, etc. in depth. And that's all the civics you get.

[A18]

The main problem with the Constitution is that it is far too modern. A better course of action would be to scrap every amendment ever ratified, as well as those de facto amendments that were never so much as constitutionally proposed, but somehow (or, rather, predictably enough) ended up the law of the land.

[MarkWarner08]

The main problem with the Constitution is that it is far too modern. A better course of action would be to scrap every amendment ever ratified, as well as those de facto amendments that were never so much as constitutionally proposed, but somehow (or, rather, predictably enough) ended up the law of the land.

No living document view of the constitution for you?

This amendment's a favorite of mine: "Mandate non-partisan redistricting for House elections to enhance electoral competition." I'm sure Professor Sabato, an eager follower of House elections, has an ulterior motive for that idea.

The national senator idea is bizarre -- does he want an American style House of Lords, where geriatrics can bloviate all day? This one seems like an afterthought: "Expand the size of the Supreme Court from 9 to 12 to be more representative." Uh, that didn't work so well in 1937, I doubt it'll succeed 70 years later. Is 12 an arbitrary number or is there some significance to it that I'm missing?

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Bad idea.  The only changes I would make to the Senate representation vis a vis the States would be to give States a third Senator so as to allow every State to elect one each election cycle.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Basically a good idea, at least as far as Presidents go.  Gives ex-Presidents something useful they can do.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Sounds good, but who decides what is non-partisan?

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Not needed nor desirable.  Having the Senate not being all elected at the same time is a good thing.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

  Doesn't require an Amendment and 1,000 is a bit too large.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Don't really care.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

  Too strict and we'll have given ourselves a straight-jacket when we have an emergency, too loose and it won't have any real effect.  Pure political theatre.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

  Frankly, if we ever have the need for massive replacements in a hurry, having a functioning Congress is going to be very low on our list of priorities.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Blech!

You must be logged in to read this quote.

If we actually followed the existing Constitution, the President would have no war-making powers.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Good idea.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Favor 35 years myself since natural born citizens need to have been a citizen 35 years to run.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Pretty much all bad ideas except for the last one, which isn't necessary since they are getting them any way.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

I have no idea what the heck he means unless he wants to formally recognize the role that parties play in our politics by enshrining it in the Constitution.  I don't see any need to burden the Constitution with such trivia.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

  Why the heck is government running party primaries anyway.  If the States silliness can manage to convince the parties to abandon the government subsidy of their selection process.  Wait a moment, silly me, asking the parties to actually pay for what they do themselves instead of out of the public purse, what was I thinking?

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Don't his proposals to expand the size of the House and add extra Senators to the bigger States already do that?

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Bad idea.  We need to allow unlimited spending, so long as it is properly reported in a timely manner.  All attempts to end private campaign spending have done over the past four decades is to make our system more corrupt not less.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Hardly worth an amendment.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

You can't mandate patriotism, and frankly such amateur service is likely to not accomplish very much.  Existing service programs are useful mainly because they give people who might be truly interested in public service a chance to find out without having to commit themselves to a career first.  What such programs achieve is a side benefit at best.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Even better, mandate a Constitutional Convention every couple of decades or so.

So basically, I only agree with 2 of his proposals, and think a few others form a useful starting point.

[??????????]

Hell, why do we need to update the constitution? No one up in DC is following it anyways.

[Erc]

The first amendment proposed could literally never be passed.  The representation scheme of the Senate is all but set in stone, and would require every single state to agree to it.  ("....no State, without its Consent, shall be deprived of its equal Suffrage in the Senate."  --Article V, on the Amendment process)

What does Amendment 2 even mean?  And do we really want Dan Quayle back in the Senate?  (And it places a disadvantage on parties who have their former Vice-Presidents win the Presidency, unless they get two votes)

Amendment 3 may not need to be an Amendment, but it might not be a bad idea, nonetheless.

Amendment 4 isn't even self-consistent.  How do you have three-year terms in the House and yet have the entire House be elected each Presidential cycle, if the President wins the referendum on the extra two years?  Plus, I agree with Ernest on this one--a landslide Presidential race shouldn't change the composition of the entire Senate, necessarily.

Amendment 5 doesn't need to be an amendment.

Amendment 7 may not be a good idea in, say, wartime or extreme economic circumstances.

None of Amendments 13-16 need to be Amendments (unless you interpret "The Judges, both of the supreme and inferior Courts, shall hold their offices during good Behavior" to be a Constitutional mandate for lifetime tenure)

I'm not going to even touch anything after 16.

[StateBoiler]

The main problem with the Constitution is that it is far too modern. A better course of action would be to scrap every amendment ever ratified, as well as those de facto amendments that were never so much as constitutionally proposed, but somehow (or, rather, predictably enough) ended up the law of the land.

So you don't think we should have freedom of speech?

If what you said did happen, in my opinion every state should have the right to decide whether they should want to continue being a member of the Union or not. My state of North Carolina originally rejected the Constitution (as did Rhode Island). NC only approved it after the Bill of Rights was added and refused to ratify it until they were added.

The only way we'll ever have reform on the Constitution from hereon is if Congress is bypassed and we go the state route. I've yet to understand why state legislatures have not passed a constitutional amendment disallowing unfunded mandates.

[Bandit3 the Worker]

He supports an amendment requiring national service, but no amendment guaranteeing the right to health care or a minimum wage?

If there's mandatory national service in the Constitution, then there ought to be FREE health care from cradle to grave too!

[Јas]

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Strongly Disagree
I like the current structure where states get equal representation. Ernest's idea to give each state a third Senator might be a good idea though.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Don't Care

You must be logged in to read this quote.

How?

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Don't care so much about term length for HoR, but I like the current set-up that the Senate is elected in thirds, so Disagree.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

 

Not sure if this would really achieve the desired aim and not sure if having 1000 members is a good idea.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Disagree.
"We have term limits, they're called elections."

You must be logged in to read this quote.

 

Strongly Disagree
The way out of the budgetary mess isn't through constitutional amendment.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

 

Disagree. By-elections should fill vacancies and in the event of mass vacancies, mass by-elections!

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Disagree. I don't approve of term limits.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Don't know enough about to really comment.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Lean approve.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

I don't think there should be any age limitation or residency limitation. Citizenship should be enough.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Approve.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

No, either set it in the text or not at all. And should only have either #13 or this one, not both.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Disapprove
More representative of what?

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Approve

You must be logged in to read this quote.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

 

Leave this for the parties to decide.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Eliminate the electoral college and have a national popular vote. One man, one vote!

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Definitely not a constitutional issue, but disagree with the principle also.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Not appropriate to be a constitutional matter either.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

OK, but like Ernest's idea to have mandated conventions after certain intervals - 25 or 30 years or something.


Overall, some good ideas, but on the whole a poor effort.

[Lief 🗽]

If anyone's interested, Larry Sabato has been invited to write some diaries explaining his proposals at DailyKos. The first one is linked below:

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2007/9/28/154724/915

[??????????]

If anyone's interested, Larry Sabato has been invited to write some diaries explaining his proposals at DailyKos. The first one is linked below:

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2007/9/28/154724/915

He's going on Kos? What does he want to ruin what reputation he had?

[Lief 🗽]

Er... he wants to get his ideas our there, and Daily Kos is one of the largest political internet communities out there.

[??????????]

Er... he wants to get his ideas our there, and Daily Kos is one of the largest political internet communities out there.

Dailykos is a leftwing hack joke. Sorry. Just because it's "large" doesn't mean its good.

[12th Doctor]

Prof. Sabato sounds like a lunitic nut.  His plan seems to be to dismantle the Republic and turn this country into a popular parlamentary system.  If he thinks the Founders would have approve of his "up-grade" then he obviously isn't much of a Constitutional scholar.

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

He just posted another diary on DailyKos.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/10/17/165535/19

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

None of Amendments 13-16 need to be Amendments (unless you interpret "The Judges, both of the supreme and inferior Courts, shall hold their offices during good Behavior" to be a Constitutional mandate for lifetime tenure)

It has been, at least for what are termed Article III courts.  Article I courts that deal only with helping Congress to administer its Article I powers are not generally for life tenure.  Thus for example, bankruptcy court judges don't have life tenure.

[Bleeding heart conservative, HTMLdon]

Prof. Sabato sounds like a lunitic nut.  His plan seems to be to dismantle the Republic and turn this country into a popular parlamentary system.  If he thinks the Founders would have approve of his "up-grade" then he obviously isn't much of a Constitutional scholar.

^^^^^^^^^

[Kaine for Senate '18]

Prof. Sabato sounds like a lunitic nut.  His plan seems to be to dismantle the Republic and turn this country into a popular parlamentary system.  If he thinks the Founders would have approve of his "up-grade" then he obviously isn't much of a Constitutional scholar.