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- Feds are running amok
- Let's give power back to states
- SUNNYSIDE (WEDNESDAY 3-3-99)--What happens when evil confronts stupidity?
- National talk-show host G. Gordon Liddy said it's a confrontation exemplified by Clinton administration Democrats as they marched in lockstep against witless Senate Republican leaders during the impeachment proceedings.
- Liddy also believes Senate Republicans are testosterone challenged. We tend to agree.
- To our knowledge, however, Liddy has never said it was the 17th Amendment, somehow passed May 31, 1913 , that structurally emasculated the U.S. Senate. The evil and the stupid operated in those days, too. Evil triumphed when the 17th became law.
- Here's why:
- Out-of-state special interest groups now sock campaign dollars into Senate races, just as they do for the House.
- It's no longer helpful for state residents to complain about U.S. Senate machinations to their local state legislators, whom they may know in person.
- States once had power to help control the "big gorilla"--federal government. The 17th crippled state power and rendered the two Congressional houses redundant.
- The 16th Amendment (also 1913) created the federal income tax and IRS, thus bankrolling the newly created "gorilla". From then until today, citizens pay literally at gunpoint (If you don't pay, the IRS will take your home. An armed YSO deputy will enforce your eviction).
- The 16th and 17th Amendments were among the one-two knockout punches that led to creation of the most powerful central government in the world, just 86 years ago. Today, rampant corruption in that central government is terribly clear to anyone with a functioning IQ over 80.
The "upper house" has become useless for curbing the legion of federal excesses frustrating many of us peons today. And state governments have practically become low-level administrative overseers of federal policies and dictums. It's time for real change.
- We should rid ourselves of the 17th Amendment and put the U.S. Senate back firmly under the control of our state legislatures. And then, let's go after the 16th Amendment with a vengeance.
- --LA
- q Click for U.S. Constitution
The way the founding fathers wrote the Constitution:- Section 3. The Senate of the United States shall be composed of two Senators from each state, chosen by the legislature thereof.
- The way it became ca 1914:
- Amendment XVII
- The Senate of the United States shall be composed of two Senators from each state, elected by the people thereof, for six years; and each Senator shall have one vote. The electors in each state shall have the qualifications requisite for electors of the most numerous branch of the state legislatures.
- When vacancies happen in the representation of any state in the Senate, the executive authority of such state shall issue writs of election to fill such vacancies: Provided, that the legislature of any state may empower the executive thereof to make temporary appointments until the people fill the vacancies by election as the legislature may direct.
- This amendment shall not be so construed as to affect the election or term of any Senator chosen before it becomes valid as part of the Constitution.