Legislature: Rescind the Con-Con Call
By Steve Byas
Legislature: Rescind the Con-Con CallJames Madison, the father of the Constitution, said he feared for the future of the republic were we to have a second constitutional convention.
A previous Oklahoma Legislature joined the call for a national convention of states – a constitutional convention to consider amendments to the U.S. Constitution – but this Legislature can join other states to correct that mistake by adopting a resolution to rescind their previous action.
I realize that there are some sincere conservative folks who think a constitutional convention is a grand idea. They are rightly frustrated at the tendency of the federal government to ignore the plain wording of the Constitution. But calling a convention now, at this time in our nation’s history, to alter the Constitution adopted in the 18th century, is more than a bad idea – it is downright dangerous.
As the late Justice Antonin Scalia put it, this is a bad century to adopt a Constitution.
Do we really want the same electorate that put Nancy Pelosi back in power to pick delegates to such proposed convention? It is naive to the extreme to think only right-wing conservatives dedicated to liberty, limited government, and free enterprise would be at this convention. It would be flooded by delegates from California and New York, all with an agenda.
The Electoral College would be in the cross-hairs. So would the Second Amendment. For that matter, there are leftists right now who want to amend the First Amendment so as to limit free speech and religious liberty. In fact, the entire Constitution would be up to revision, and even being replaced altogether with one more friendly to socialism. Even if the constitutional convention met and adopted only good amendments (highly unlikely), if the government is going to ignore our present Constitution, why would they honor any good amendments that could come out of it? And the likelihood is that few, if any, good amendments would emerge from any such convention. Instead, we could expect several leftist-tinged amendments.
James Madison, the father of the Constitution, said he feared for the future of the republic were we to have a second constitutional convention.
Let’s make sure we do not have one and take the chance that we could lose the federal republic created by the Founders. Rescind the call!
Steve Byas is editor of the Oklahoma Constitution newspaper. He may be contacted at: byassteve@yahoo.com
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