I agree that Mmmm was trolling. I just a bit of offense at having my views on the constitution being treated as if I have a simplistic view (I am the OP after all).

I meant 60% of the popular vote. 

As for states, I'd love to see an anti-gerrymandering law passed, I think that would be constitutional- something that forces states to use Iowa's voters commissions.  (I don't think it says in the constitution that states have the power to set their House districts)  What I'd really like to see is the districting powers being given to the electoral college- something to take it out of state hands entirely, and requiring a 3/5th supermajority to force a compromise.  (what's needed for electoral districts is forced compromise)

The fact that Republicans hold 38 of 50 state legislatures despite getting under half the votes in national elections- say something about the power of gerrymandering.

I don't think that would work out very well. It's supposed to be the United STATES. What works well for New York may not work so well for Idaho.
 

We're talking about the *state* legislatures. You can't just wave that away through gerrymandering.  Rural areas have traditionally been slightly over-represented and that continues to be the case. Rural areas, today, tend to be Republican. 

That's why I suggested 60%.   At some point the majority has to be able to impose its will on the minority.

As for gerrymandering, it's worse at the State Level than the Federal Level.  The NC State Legislature, it's estimated for the Dems to get it back, it has to go Dem+10 for that to happen.   (and this is why you've seen NC go radical the past few years)   It's not like NC is a hard-right state either, it was Romney+2 in 2012, and has had split Senate for much of the last 30-40 years.

Either that, or we need to make it easier for parts of states to secede from their state governments.  (I'm fine with that in both directions)

WOW. That is a scary attitude. I don't want to discuss this further with you.

yes you are and I respect that.

You are welcome to whatever idiosyncratic interpretation of the Constitution you want.  However, in the real world, what the Federal government can do boils down to what the Supreme Court says the federal government can do.  And the real sticking point is the Elastic Clause that I mentioned in the thread you forked this one from:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elastic_clause

In practice, this clause gives the feds to do a HELL of a lot that isn't specifically listed in the original post. For example, I don't see anything about National Banks in the original post, but even in the time of the founding fathers, the Elastic Clause had been used to allow the Feds to create laws allowing National Banks.

Basically, the Supreme Court has historically been pretty lenient on ruling that this clause of the Constitution gives VERY broad authority to Congress.  You are welcome to say "NUH UH" til you are blue in the face, but ultimately your opinion doesn't really matter when it comes to these legal issues.

I'm aware of history, and history says that your personal, extremely narrow interpretation of the Constitution isn't how its ever been interpreted, even in the times of the founding fathers.  We can debate about the strengths and weaknesses of a strong federal government, but the reality is that the feds have always had pretty broad powers under the Elastic Clause.

Congress has the power to collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, coin money, and regulate it's value.  Looks pretty plain to me as one of them gray areas.

You're also linking a page that points out the fears at the time that the necessary and proper clause would lead to an all powerful federal government that threatened the liberty of the people.  Oh look, there it is!

You should stop trying to find justification for your viewpoints in everything and consider the merits.  Right now, the Supreme Court could outlaw buttsex because they say so, require a surveillance camera in your bedroom to make sure you're following the law, and decide it was treason to break it, qualifying you for an execution.  The only thing to prevent it would be an amendment specifically allowing the actions, and they can damn well ignore that too and say it still is.  The only thing preventing them from it is their own opinions.

It's perhaps fortunate [or not] that the two people monitoring such threads as this one have [almost] diametrically opposed views on lots of things...

It means every side of the proverbial coin is treated fairly/equitably.

Curiously though....what constituted trollish comment popped into the radar of both myself AND the Op ....;)

Have an opinion....voice it as eloquently/clearly as possible, without personal defamation/attack and the suggestion of 'troll' will go away...;)

Actually lost a bit of sleep thinking about this post. It's a pretty one sided view of things of which a great majority I concur with but on the other hand, lacks a certain something.

I don't believe that the second amendment was created so that people can own automatic weapons or say, a 50 cal. sniper rifle to hunt little furry things. If taken in the context of the day it merely states that the militia (which was volunteer) has the right to bear arms. By arms we're talking about muskets. I do think if the framers knew what weaponry would be available today that they would have been more explicit in their descriptions. I don't have anything against guns, own several over the years, but some of the people that do own guns scare the heck out of me. They are also way to accessible by those that shouldn't have them.

Hooray, we've abolished slavery. When I think of slavery I picture black folks picking cotton while the plantation owner sips his mint julep on the veranda. They had no rights and it was up to the slave owner to provide room and board. I guess they even had medical to some degree. Well now we have the Hispanics, or illegal immigrants, which aren't necessarily Hispanic. They have no rights and work for slave wages (not a living wage). Here in NC you have to have proof of citizenship in order to vote but employers do not have to have proof of citizenship to hire. I think it's ironic that the same group of people that bitch about illegal immigrants are the same group of people that allow business to hire them. You want to stop illegal's from entering the country, require proof of citizenship to work here. Fine employers that violate this big, really big.

Equal protection under the law states the 14th amendment. That means to me that you are protected by the same laws that protect me. Well, unless you're gay and want to get married. Marriage is governed by civil law and is a legally binding contract between two people that wish to share the benefits that co-habitation can bring. I really don't see what people have against this. If I can marry why shouldn't any two consenting adults be able to do the same. Oh, I know, because it says so in the bible. Which, I might add, is a textbook example of why we have separation of church and state. If you really want to be fair about it, make marriage illegal for all, problem solved.

Maybe now you can understand why I thought earlier on that posting this was pointless.

Absolutely.

Which is why it's also known as the "Equal Suffering Clause."

After all, if heteros have to suffer, shouldn't everyone?

Meh the commerce clause Can, Has and will be used to justify just about anything the federal government wants. Which makes the whole concept of "enumerated powers" moot. I mean its been affirmed that they can regulate what you buy, what you don't buy, what you possess, what you grow, etc etc etc via the commerce clause. Hell they even can use it as the basis for a prosecution if you used an object that crossed state lines.

(anyone remember those amish guys who were indicted on the basis that the hair clippers they used to shave other amish beards were produced in a different state therefore was interstate commerce? That is to say the interstate commerce clause is the basis for the federal hate crimes law and actually a vast majority of federal laws.)

I know Brad said he didn't want to discuss this with me, but I gotta say something, so I'll make it general.  I do understand where Brad is coming from- and I do understand his concerns- we have Egypt and the MB as an example of that, so I get where he's coming from , even if I don't agree with it, and find his position as scary as he finds mine.

1) Maybe 60% is too low a threshhold.  That said, what is the proper threshhold, 100%?  90%?  67%.   Put the threshhold too high, and a small minority can keep evil things in place, which has happened in our history.  Our system does allow tyranny of the minority.  I think that is equally scary.

60% is a number that I think is sufficient to say something has bipartisan support on a national level.   It can also be repealed like Prohibition was.  That said, it's a number, and the optimal number is up for debate, or even whether this is a good idea or not.

2) I generally trust the average voter in this country on the national level to be generally decent.  I couldn't see them knowingly enshrining something truly evil into the constitution.  (states are small enough that it could happen, but a country of 300million people it's truly hard)

Lot of good stuff there.

Re 2nd amendment: Even without the second amendment, the federal government has very little to do with what guns are allowed or not. In theory, a STATE or a county should be able to make it illegal to own guns. The second amendment, however, says that the people's right to bear arms shall not be infringed which indicates its broader than just the federal government.

Re "Slavery". Voluntarily working is not the same as slavery. Your world view on how much people should get paid has nothing to do with slavery. Slavery isn't defined as how much you're paid. It's defined as involuntary servitude.

Re Marriage. Nothing to do with the federal government.  Marriage is at the state level.  You want gay marriage then get your state to vote it in for themselves.  The only sticky point is whether OTHER states have to recognize your marriage in which case I'd say no.  I personally don't think the government should be in the marriage business at all.

The point of the constitution was to keep the FEDERAL government from going nuts. If a state wants to do crazy stuff, let them. People can vote with their feet.

Ok Alstein, let's do a thought exercise:

Imagine 60% national vote was all it took to get a new constitutional amendment passed.

I suspect there would have been times where more than 60% of the population would have supported imprisonment for homosexuals. Imagine that being in the constitution. 

How about if 60% of the population decided that atheists should be executed. Don't like it? Don't think it could ever happen? I'm still amazed that we outlawed alchohol in this country for a decade+.

I don't want my right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness put up to a vote.  I don't care if you have 95% of the population on your side, each citizen is entitled to certain, inalienable, human rights. That's not up for a vote.

You are absolutely right that would be wrong. 

The thing is, it could already be put up to a vote. There is nothing in the Constitution that prevents you from passing a Constitutional Amendment that invalidates something previously in the Constitution.  If 95% of the population wants your right to life, liberty, pursuit of happiness destroyed- it's going to happen. It can take much less than that, all you need really is 5 Supreme Court justices, the Presidency, and Congress.

If there was enough popular will out there for this country to,as an example,  want atheists executed, it could be put into the Constitution.   A constitutional Amendment can override another Constitutional Amendment.

I see you as arguing that 60% is too low for the Constitution to be amended.   That's a perfectly fair and valid argument.   That said, a small minority of the government in the past kept Jim Crow laws, and earlier slavery, intact.  In the case of the 24th Amendment, that was flat-out the rest of the country imposing its will on the South.  Was that a bad thing?  

BTW state law cannot trump the Constitution.  The 14th Amendment enshrined that in Section 1.

Except that there are a pretty large number of directly counter examples to this.  For example:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assault_weapons_ban

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_Control_Act_of_1968

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domestic_Violence_Offender_Gun_Ban

A simple google search can turn up a lot more if you want.

The federal government has historically had broad power to regulate firearms, typically under the Commerce Clause.

Once again what really matters is how the courts interpret the Constitution, not your personal, very libertarian view of things.  And the courts tend to give pretty broad interpretation of both the Commerce and the Elastic Clauses, which allows the Feds great power in regulating firearms.  Basically, they can control sales and distribution under the Commerce Clause, although outright bans would not be allowed (per Heller and McDonald v Chicago). 

No.  The courts get to rule and this and they have.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McDonald_v._Chicago

Just a small point here, I'm pretty sure the 2A has nothing whatsoever to do with hunting anything. The 2A was put in specifically for use against other humans, and the gov't itself if necessary.

Been lurking for this discussion and for the most part it has been pretty civil. Bravo to most of you!

The federal system is designed with checks and balances. If the Supreme Court went nuts with stuff like that, they would simply be impeached by the legislative branch.  I'm not really sure what you are trying to get at here.

I always thought the point of the constitution was to protect the people and define the role of government. I think the feds should establish national standards. Life, liberty and pursuit of happiness should be that same throughout the nation. Not just here or there but fair across the board for all.

Sarcasm Leo, just sarcasm but thank you for pointing that out.

He is going for a classic libertarian interpretation of the Constitution, which calls for very narrow interpretations of the Commerce and Elastic clauses.  However, as I've shown above with my counter examples, this is not how the Constitution has been historically interpreted by the Supreme Court, which is what really matters.

With that being said, the whole point of a federal system is that not everything will be the same in every state.  "Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" is from the Declaration of Independence, which has no legal weight.

However, the Feds have been willing to take care of some of that stuff (for example, the equal rights laws aimed at getting rid of Jim Crow type stuff in the South back in the middle of the 20th Century).

Wrong, wrong, all wrong.

One simple example to show how wrong Brad is:  "In addition, 27 amendments were added to the constitution to further clarify any remaining question on what the federal government is allowed to do."

No, the Amendments do not merely clarify; in several cases, they alter significantly (over what had been present in the Constitution) what is or is not constitutionally allowed.  A rather blaring example was the Constitution, in its original form, implicitly allowed ownership of people -- slavery -- explicitly present in the original Constitution as "other persons" in the fairly well-known "three-fifths compromise" but slavery was later completely abolished, in defiance of the U.S. Constitution, by the 13th and 14th amendments.  The thirteenth amendment, abolishing slavery, changed the U.S. Constitution significantly; it did not merely 'clarify' a 'remaining question on what the federal government is allowed to do.'

Various amendments are quite vague and undergo various interpretations.  There are lawyers who specialize in Constitutional law.  If you do not have a law degree, chances are you will not fare well attempting to argue Constitutional law in an actual court.  Brad's entire original post completely ignores this "simple" fact on how un-simple the Constitution and legal interpretations of it are.

You haven't even read the 2nd amendment if you believe it reads "Congress shall pass no law prohibiting anyone from owning a gun."  Its quite explicit what the 'right to bear arms' permits, and in fact it specifies quite clearly "well-regulated."