Anyone heard of the "Convention of States Project?"

[LongTomH]

Yesterday, I was talking with a friend who likes to 'infiltrate' GOP meetings and talks by RW politicians. He brought an agenda from a GOP lunch in KC which included an item about a "Convention of the States" project. Apparently, this is a Koch-funded movement to rewrite the US Constitution in ways more acceptable to the right in general, and of course, the Kochs in particular.

It turns out that The Convention of States Project has a website and a Facebook page. Their website talks about debt and spending, specifically 'entitlement spending.' Read their response to the John Birch Society for details. They seem to be particularly disturbed by Article 1, Section 8, Clause 1 of the Constitution, which allows for collection of taxes and has the "Promote the General Welfare" clause.

Want to bet their new constitution will include repeal of:

• The Sixteenth Amendment, allowing the federal government to collect an income tax,
  
• The The Seventeenth Amendment providing for direct election of senators by popular vote.

Apparently they have already introduced this into the Virginia House of Representatives, and it has passed the Rules Committee by an 8-7 vote.

What can we do about this? Right now, just publicize it and look for it to be introduced into the legislature in your state.

[Dawson Leery]

1. First time I have heard of them.

Just another Paulite-pro-nullification group.

[summerschild]

2. Remember when Mike Huckabee first talked about running for President and he said

he wanted to rewrite the Constitution to agree with the Bible? Lord help us all. They are lunatics.

[2naSalit]

3. K&R!!

[KamaAina]

4. We just took control of the VA Senate

It'll be DOA.

[Xithras]

5. People have been calling for constitutional conventions for the better part of a century.

None of them ever go anywhere, because they regularly run into two problems:

1) Once started, there's no way to limit the scope of a convention. The right could introduce a motion repealing the 14th Amendment, but the left could introduce a motion mandating execution for lawmakers trying to deprive others of the vote. EVERYTHING would be on the table, and EVERYTHING would be "constitutional". It would devolve into an incredible mess.

2) Any new constitution would need to be ratified by 3/4 of the states to become binding. There is simply no way that a modified constitution that favored one political side or the other could pass that many state houses. In fact, it's doubtful that much of ANYTHING could pass that many state houses nowadays.