NO CON-CON
"Make Georgia FREE Again!"
What is a CON-CON?
In 2014 Georgia applied for an Article V constitutional convention or con-con which passed both chambers on February 20, 2014 and has since expired on January 1, 2020. (see SR-371)
We are told by those who want a con-con that they only want to hold a con-con in order to include a Balanced Budget Amendment or BBA, and to include a Term-Limit Amendment or TLA.
On the surface this may seem like a good idea... but ...
According to our US Constitution, there are two distinct ways to amend the US Constitution. The first way is by two-thirds vote of both chambers of Congress. Using this congressional method, an amendment may be made to the Constitution without making any other changes.
The second way is by application of two-thirds (34 of 50) of the states for a constitutional convention or con-con. Using this con-con method, all bets are off since once a con-con is convened, then anything and everything is open to change during the convention.
The last time this occurred was in 1787, in which the Articles of Confederation was completely ditched in favor of an entirely new Constitution. Furthermore, during the 1787 con-con, the means of ratification was also changed from unanimous to two-thirds (9 of 13) of the states.
While this worked in our favor back in 1787, when many patriotic leaders of the American Revolution were involved, in todays' political climate we can only cringe at what our current leaders might change if we were to have another con-con now.
When our Founding Fathers met in 1787 to remedy the defects of the Articles of Confederation, it was because they had been following these Articles for several years, and it was because of this that they knew the Articles were not working and needed to be changed!
On the other hand, we have not been following our Constitution for many decades, so how can we rightfully claim our Constitution is not working when we have not been following it?
Our Constitution does not need to be re-written... it needs to be re-read!
Furthermore, because of the way our current financial system operates, if we were to impose a BBA now, without first reforming our financial system, then either our economy would collapse as we contracted our money supply to match our current tax revenue, or our taxes would sky-rocket into the stratosphere to make up in taxes what currently is obtained through “borrowing” money into existence. Either way, our economy would be crushed, and our nation destroyed.
Finally, the State of Georgia has no business requesting a con-con in order to discipline the federal government into balancing its budget while we continue to take federal funds for all sorts of unconstitutional purposes such as education and healthcare... talk about hypocrisy!
As for term-limits (TLA), all this would accomplish is that:
Nothing good will come of either a BBA or TLA without major system reform first. The last thing we need right now is to change a constitution that we do not follow! Instead, we need to rescind all existing con-con applications and make sure we don't do this again anytime soon!
Instead of re-writing our great Constitution, We the People need to re-discover it! And we must follow it consistently before we ever consider how we might improve upon it, which we can already do with simple amendments - we do not need a con-con!
We are told by those who want a con-con that they only want to hold a con-con in order to include a Balanced Budget Amendment or BBA, and to include a Term-Limit Amendment or TLA.
On the surface this may seem like a good idea... but ...
According to our US Constitution, there are two distinct ways to amend the US Constitution. The first way is by two-thirds vote of both chambers of Congress. Using this congressional method, an amendment may be made to the Constitution without making any other changes.
The second way is by application of two-thirds (34 of 50) of the states for a constitutional convention or con-con. Using this con-con method, all bets are off since once a con-con is convened, then anything and everything is open to change during the convention.
The last time this occurred was in 1787, in which the Articles of Confederation was completely ditched in favor of an entirely new Constitution. Furthermore, during the 1787 con-con, the means of ratification was also changed from unanimous to two-thirds (9 of 13) of the states.
While this worked in our favor back in 1787, when many patriotic leaders of the American Revolution were involved, in todays' political climate we can only cringe at what our current leaders might change if we were to have another con-con now.
When our Founding Fathers met in 1787 to remedy the defects of the Articles of Confederation, it was because they had been following these Articles for several years, and it was because of this that they knew the Articles were not working and needed to be changed!
On the other hand, we have not been following our Constitution for many decades, so how can we rightfully claim our Constitution is not working when we have not been following it?
Our Constitution does not need to be re-written... it needs to be re-read!
Furthermore, because of the way our current financial system operates, if we were to impose a BBA now, without first reforming our financial system, then either our economy would collapse as we contracted our money supply to match our current tax revenue, or our taxes would sky-rocket into the stratosphere to make up in taxes what currently is obtained through “borrowing” money into existence. Either way, our economy would be crushed, and our nation destroyed.
Finally, the State of Georgia has no business requesting a con-con in order to discipline the federal government into balancing its budget while we continue to take federal funds for all sorts of unconstitutional purposes such as education and healthcare... talk about hypocrisy!
As for term-limits (TLA), all this would accomplish is that:
- good legislators won't be in office very long no matter how good they legislate
- such high turnover won't lead to better officials because of who is voting them into office
- good officials will have less incentive to pass good legislation because they will soon be looking for a job from the same special interests who do not want such laws passed
- our voting power will decrease since we will be prevented from voting for good candidates whose terms limits have been reached, whereas today we are not so limited.
Nothing good will come of either a BBA or TLA without major system reform first. The last thing we need right now is to change a constitution that we do not follow! Instead, we need to rescind all existing con-con applications and make sure we don't do this again anytime soon!
Instead of re-writing our great Constitution, We the People need to re-discover it! And we must follow it consistently before we ever consider how we might improve upon it, which we can already do with simple amendments - we do not need a con-con!
Do you want to RESTORE our Constitution?
