Jpritikin,
Thank you for your well thought out rebuttal. It can only be a benefit for all of us to engage in this discussion. I would also like to offer my apologies for the length of this rebuttal. I tried my best to be as concise as possible, but given the topic at hand, it proved too difficult.
I would like to note that this has been discussed at some length at Senator Gravel’s website. I mention this, because some of your points were raised there.
http://www.mikegravel.us/?q=node/1945
1) I think that you have misinterpreted my argument here. I pointed out that the 2nd sentence of the Preamble of the Democracy Act states:
“We asserted this power in our Declaration of Independence and in the ratification of our Constitution.”
The Ratification Article of the Constitution, Article 7, states the following:
“The Ratification of the Conventions of nine States, shall be sufficient for the Establishment of this Constitution between the States so ratifying the Same.”
I don’t think it’s plausible to think that you can enact a direct democracy via assertion.
There is nothing, asserted or otherwise, in the Constitution that permits changing how our government functions by a majority vote of registered voters. At best, you could argue that this is a radical interpretation of the 9th Amendment, an interpretation that I doubt the Supreme Court would find agreeable. The manner by which an amendment can be made to the US Constitution is pretty clear. Article 5 covers this. Either two-thirds of Congress and the States or three-fourths of the States.
2) The Electoral Trust, like Congress, is a representative body. It should be clear to everyone the deficiencies of representative government. It seems foolish to me to think that the Electoral Trust wouldn’t have the same deficiencies. The Sergeant of Arms, unlike the Electoral Trust, is not elected. This too will be discussed at more length below.
3) The nature of power needs to be understood here. The old cliché is that power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. I would say that the degree of corruption is equally proportional to the degree of power. With that in mind, the more participatory the NI4D, the greater the degree the distribution of power is to our citizens.
We should also note, that it is extraordinarily rare for dictators and tyrants to voluntarily cede their power. Power is an elixir and it’s quite addictive. For those who have it, they will not give it up without a struggle. That is true of a single powerful person, such as a President, or a group of people, such as an economic class or a legislative body.
What we should also note is that the NI4D is a powerful tool. It grants extraordinary powers to those who participate in it. Any glance at the expenditures needed to field Congressional candidates should bear this out. The ability to write legislation is power. For those who have it, they will not be comfortable granting that power to others, as it diminishes their monopoly on that power.
Since that is the case, the NI4D establishes a set of incentives by requiring only registered voters be allowed to participate. The incentive set up is to make it difficult to allow people to register to vote. How long would it take for an initiative to pass that would require a large sum of money in order to register as a participant in the NI4D?
For this reason, section 3-A of the NI4D sets up a very scary precedent, one that could possibly even threaten your right to vote for our elected officials.
My proposal, Article Eight, completely bypasses this entire problem in Section 1, Clause 1:
“The House of the People shall be composed of the entirety of We the People.”
The only requirement to participate in The House of the People is to be 1) a US citizen for 10 years (which would include your childhood if you’re a natural-born citizen), and 2) be at least 18 years old.
4) Yes, it is bad to be nitpicky. One of the brilliant things our Founding Fathers did was to establish a method by which our Constitution could change with the times. For that reason, our Constitution established what is now the oldest government in the world, despite the fact that we’re a relatively young nation.
This genius was achieved a few ways. 1) it established a method by which the Constitution could be amended. 2) it gave the three branches of government some flexibility on how it will conduct its business. For instance, Article 1, Section 5, Clause 2 establishes that:
”Each House may determine the Rules of its Proceedings“
Unlike the NI4D, the Constitution allows Congress to change how they will conduct business. If some part of the procedure becomes a hindrance, Congress can change it. The NI4D doesn’t permit this. Instead the authors of the NI4D already establishes that procedure. Should the NI4D be amended into the US Constitution, changing that procedure would be as difficult as enacting the NI4D in the first place.
This is why my proposal, Article Eight, borrowing language directly from the Constitution, states in Clause 1, Section 6:
”The House of the People shall chuse the manner by which they will conduct its Rules of Proceedings”.
5) The problem with Section 3-C is precisely that it pertains to particular jurisdictions. There is nothing that I can see in the NI4D that prevents a the Electoral Board to submit an initiative that is federal in scope to the city-level in order to manipulate the initiative process if the Board members happen to be opposed to that particular initiative. Giving the Electoral Trust the ability to rewrite the Title and Summary of a particular initiative is a very effective way to railroading an initiative that the Electoral Board may happen to not like. This isn’t a very far-fetched idea, as anyone familiar with The PATRIOT Act should know.
6) This has been discussed at some length at Mike Gravel’s website, the URL of which I furnished above. My argument isn’t that a 5000 word limit is too low. My argument is that it’s an unnecessary restriction. Furthermore, I would argue that such a limit contradicts the First Amendment protection of free speech. People have the right not to be concise. An initiative that is not concise should be weighed by the People when considering a particular proposal, and in my view should be weighed negatively. However, that doesn’t change the fact that an initiative could be a good one that the People would be in favor of that goes over the 5000 word limit. A practical example would be an overhaul of our nation’s tax code. And not to belabor the point, but my proposal, Article Eight, using the same word-count criteria that you established is 446 words.
7) I don’t see what the purpose is of having a two year limit for an initiative. I wouldn’t see how an initiative would circulate for 50 years. Quite frankly, I couldn’t see one circulating for 2 years either, but isn’t the point of this proposal to give the People the power to govern themselves how they see fit? If we tell them extensively how they can govern themselves, are we really setting up a real direct democracy with the NI4D?
8) Section 3-E-2 demonstrates to me one of the most flawed and dangerous aspects of the NI4D. It allows the Electoral Trust to pass binding national laws based upon poll results. This, by definition, isn’t democratic. It is a classic example of tyranny of the minority. Yes, the Electoral Trust is permitted to approve of who will be conducting that poll. That means that the Electoral Trust can get laws passed by itself with a little bit of innovation and a lack of scruples. A cursory look at what happens in Washington demonstrates that this would likely happen.
So here’s an example of how this might work. Suppose a group of jackasses get elected to the Electoral Trust. And suppose they want to get legislation passed to, I dunno, increase the pay of Electoral Trust members to 5 billion dollars a year. In order to get this passed an Electoral Trust member can write the proposed legislation himself, hire a push-polling company to conduct a misleading poll, wording it in order to trick people into approving it, and voilà! the Electoral Trust members are suddenly handsomely rich.
9) Nothing precludes the People from calling their own townhall meeting to debate an initiative, so long as it is in agreement with “the policies and procedures established by the Electoral Trust.” Suppose the Electoral Trust establishes policies and procedures that initiatives cannot be debated publicly without their consent. Then what happens? Would the Supreme Court have the ability to rule that this is a violation of the First Amendment protection to peacefully petition your government for a redress of grievances?
10) This was also covered at some length at Mike Gravel’s website, which I noted above. Giving the Electoral Trust the ability to rewrite an initiative essentially gives the Electoral Trust the ability to act as lawmakers. Would they “clean up” the language of a poorly drafted pieced of legislation, or would they re-write it to their own desires? The nature of power indicates that they would do the later.
11) Asking the legislative for an advisory vote only seems to me to introduce far too much red tape to the entire process. It raises a lot of problems. 1) if the passage of an initiative requires a legislative advisory vote, then what happens if the legislative refuses to take up the vote? Does the initiative then die? If not, is the relevant legislative body being told how to conduct their schedule? 2) Allowing the legislative to have an advisory vote could help derail important reforms that are needed.
Here’s how this could play out. Suppose there’s an initiative proposed to completely eliminate arsenic from our drinking water. It comes before Congress for an advisory vote. Congress sees this initiative, and knows that it is strongly supported by the people. This bothers a lot of members of Congress, who are in the pockets of polluters. So Congress passes a law that limits the levels of arsenic in our drinking water from say 800 parts per billion to 500 parts per billion. Once passed, Congress holds a big press conference saying that they have eliminated arsenic from our drinking water. The public momentum for this initiative dies and we still have arsenic in our drinking water.
12) Yes, I am saying that under Section 3-K the Electoral Trust can indefinitely suspend votes on certain initiatives. Suppose there’s an initiative that the Electoral Trust doesn’t want passed. Then all they have to do is schedule it for a vote 2 years and 1 day into the future. Yes, the Electoral Trust is required to conduct the initiative process chronologically. But then again, under the US Constitution, only Congress has the right to declare war. What prevents the Electoral Trust from scheduling all initiatives two years into the future?
13) Before I begin, let me suggest some reading here. A couple years ago two researchers, Conradt and Roper, wrote an interesting study on democratic decision making in herds of animals. Their study was published in the journal Nature. It can be found here.
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v421/n6919/full/nature01294.html
Now, first we should understand precisely how minority rights are protected in this country. To understand that, we have to understand that our government is a constitutionally-limited republican democracy.
The Founders were influenced by many of the enlightenment thinkers such as Hume and Rousseau. Rousseau noted in The Social Contract that the natural state of man is complete freedom. By the laws of nature man is free. Free to murder, rape, and destroy. Of course, this is hardly practical. So, as Rousseau reasoned, government is set up as a contract among the people to limit certain rights, such as the right to murder, in order to enhance the safety and well being of a People. The Founders believed this was precisely the case, which is why our Constitution begins with the words “We the People”. What the Founders wanted to prevent was a government that had the ability to limit certain rights which they deemed “inalienable”. This is why, if you read the First Amendment, it does not say that The People have the right to free speech. Instead it prevents government from taking that right away with the words, “Congress shall make no law…”
However, Congress could pass a law prohibiting free speech. That is precisely why we have a court system. Our courts act as the protectors of our rights. The judges are free from need to be re-elected by lifetime appointments, and therefore are far less prone to political corruption than Congress, who needs to always come back for campaign funds. This hasn’t always worked well, but it has worked reasonably well over the last 230 some years that we have been a nation.
We should note that the only way to bypass the Supreme Court, once it has ruled a law unconstitutional is by amending the Constitution. This, of course, is a task that requires a supermajority. A supermajority is a very good protector of minority rights. While it is quite easy to get 50%+1 to agree with something that is for the moment politically popular, it’s a lot harder to get two thirds or three quarters to go along with it. A simple majority is a very easy thing to accomplish, even if it’s broken up into two elections. That poses a danger.
If the philosophy of democracy could be defined with just a few words, I would say it would have to be “two heads are better than one.” When it comes to very grave and serious decisions, I want as many heads as possible to agree before moving forward.
14) Section 3-N states:
“After an initiative has been enacted into statute law, courts, when requested, may determine the constitutionality of the law.”
In any case, I should note that the language of the NI4D only allows the courts to review the constitutionality of enacted initiatives when it requests it. Which leads me to wonder, who grants those requests? The Electoral Trust? The NI4D is quite hostile to judicial review throughout the entire language of the NI4D. Given how the court’s function is to protect minority rights, this makes me a bit suspicious, if not weary.
15) Why should any money be donated to finance the campaigns of any initiative? It can only corrupt the process. Why not give free and equal public access to all proposed initiatives?
16) If any American doesn’t have a mistrust of representative government by now, then I fear they’re simply gullible, aren’t paying attention, or both. As the Electoral Trust is a representative body, then it’s worthy of an equal distrust. While the inexperience of a newly elected Electoral Board member is something to consider, that weighs far less heavy on my conscious than having the ability to throw all the bums out at once. There is no real on-the-job training for most high ranking government positions, and this fact has rarely hindered this nation.
I have already noted that the Electoral Board does indeed write law, if it so chooses. But that’s avoiding the point. The point is that when you have a large constituent to representative ratio, then you get a less responsive (and thus less democratic) government.
Let me explain this in more detail. We have 435 members of the House of Representatives. 100 members of the Senate. 1 President. Who do you have more sway with? This varies depending on where you live, and how densely populated your part of the country is, but with about 300 million Americans, and 435 Congressmen, then you’d get about 690,000 constituents per Congressman. That means, in order to influence your Congressman you have to compete with 690,000 other persons. Now let’s look at Senators. I have no idea what a median state population might be, but I would guess that most states have over 2 million residents. With 2 senators, that’s a million other constituents you have to compete with. When it comes down to the President, it’s your voice out of 300 million others. At that level, you basically have no say at all.
For this reason, the House of Representatives has always been more responsive to the People than the Senate. I would say the Senate is hardly responsive to the People at all. If you compare that to the Electoral Trust, which only has 53 members, and who are representing an equal number of people that the Senate does, then by definition, the Electoral Trust would be about half as responsive to the People as the US Senate. What their duties entail is besides the point. What’s important is that structurally, the Electoral Trust is less democratic than the US Senate.
17) I don’t think “compromise” is the word you’re looking for. I think “flaw” is more appropriate. The last thing anyone should be doing when setting up a new way to run our government is to look at rosy scenarios. After all, that worked great in Iraq, didn’t it? Instead it makes sense to think in terms of worse case scenarios. Once you figure that out, you can better ameliorate those flaws, which one would hope might avoid disaster for our posterity. But worse then rosy scenarios, the last thing you should do is put “trust” in your elected officials. After all, if our elected representatives were trust worthy, then there would be no need to give the people law making ability in the first place.
18) It makes me uneasy to think that the Interim Board set up to establish the NI4D would be composed of the very same people who manage our elections. If the NI4D had been established in 2000, that would mean Katherine Harris would be a member of the Interim Board representing the state of Florida. In 2004 it would mean that Ken Blackwell would be the Interim Board member representing Ohio. Imagine, the very same people who have given us the fraud of electronic voting machines would be the very same people who would be establishing the NI4D. If that doesn’t give you a moment’s pause, then you’re a far more trusting person than I. I would argue that you lend that trust at your own peril.
19) While I will acknowledge that the term “Chief Executive Officer” isn’t nearly as important as some of the other issues I have raised, it does concern me. The terms “President”, “Prime Minister”, “Executive Secretary”, “Director” or “Chairman” would work fine. There are a host of titles that would be appropriate. But what concerns me about using the corporate term “Chief Executive Officer”, is that it would create a kind of corporate mentality or atmosphere in the Electoral Trust. I think it is also demonstrative of the mindset of the author(s) of the NI4D. Corporate structures, by definition, are hierarchical and anti-democratic. Using what I see as anti-democratic terminology to establish a supposedly direct democratic form of government is ironic at best, fraudulent at worse.
20) If you had two options, which one of these would you choose? Option one, you can only get what you want by stating what you don’t want. Option two, you can state what you do want, and can state what you don’t want. Which option gives you more choice? There is no good reason not to be able to elect the CEO of the Electoral Trust. The only purpose would be to limit the power of the American People.
21) My point was that Section 4-D-3 establishes that a election for the Electoral Trust CEO wouldn’t even happen in the case of death or vacancy of the CEO.
22) I’m certainly no lawyer, but I have never heard of any US court ruling on a law that hasn’t been enacted yet. This seems like a very poor excuse to include such language. What Section 4-F-1 actually does is give the Electoral Board members the ability to violate the law, on the basis that the NI4D supercedes US Law.
23) I’m not sure what’s confusing about the concern I raised in Section 4-F-4. If the Electoral Board has the ability to set the policies and procedures for how an initiative is to be presented to the public, than that gives the Electoral Board the ability to frame initiatives they don’t like negatively.
Suppose there’s an initiative proposed to requires all Electoral Board members to list their business investments online so the People will be aware of any possible conflict of interests. The Electoral Board would name this initiative the “Boneheaded Initiative”.
24) This has already been covered above.
25) Section 4-F-6 gives the Electoral Board the ability to decide how their own members will be elected. Imagine if you could decide for yourself under what circumstances your employer could fire you.
26) Under the US Constitution, only the House of Representatives are allowed to allocate tax payer funds. The NI4D allows itself to allocate it’s own funds, a power that the Senate and the President doesn’t have. Given all the other flaws in the NI4D, I think this is a dangerous idea.
27) The NI4D is not a contract. Telling the US courts precisely how they are permitted to rule when it comes to the NI4D not only constrains our nation’s judicial branch, but is extraordinarily arrogant. It is saying that the Courts have the right to rule on the Constitutionality of any particular section of the NI4D, but that the courts have no right to rule on the Constitutionality of the NI4D itself.
I don’t care what the inspiration was for setting up the Electoral Trust. If you trust representative government, then you shouldn’t support the NI4D, as there is no need for it, since Congress is already a representative government body. If you don’t trust representative government, then you shouldn’t support the NI4D, as it sets up a whole new representative government bureaucracy.
As for my own proposal, Article Eight, Jpritikin raises a criticism that Article Eight only operates at the federal level. I structured this for reasons of simplicity and strategy. Once Article Eight is enacted, a law can be passed by the People allowing state and local jurisdictions to enact their own direct democratic forms of government. However, since the circumstances of each state differs, it makes sense to allow the citizens of each state to choose how to establish their own local direct democratic governments.
The strategic reason for this goes right back to the nature of power. A tyrant will never voluntarily give up their own power. However, one tyrant might be willing to give away the power of another tyrant if it has almost no effect on them. Which brings us back to how all this could be realized. It has been argued by NI4D proponents that Article 7 of the US Constitution sets up a precedent for enacting the NI4D. In the first part of my video, I showed how this was not the case, simply because Article 7 includes the words “this Constitution”. For this reason, the only way I can see ourselves establishing a form of direct democracy is via Article 5.
Now, the requirements of Article 5 is pretty clear. Get two thirds of Congress and the states to go along with an amendment, or get three quarters of the states to go along with an amendment. The three quarters route bypasses Congress all together. For that reason, it’s our best shot. State legislators might be more willing to give away the power of members of the US Congress, but they would hardly be willing to give away their own power. Therefore, Article Eight only functions on the federal level.
Which brings me to what I’ve identified as the 28th problem with the NI4D. While it does function on the state and local level, it doesn’t prevent, as far as I can tell, one jurisdiction from interfering with another.
Our Founders were wise in establishing the interstate commerce clause of the Constitution. If two states are dealing with commerce with each other, the federal government has the ability to step in and control what was going on. If the legislature of one state passed a law that would interfere with another state, the federal government could step in, or the courts could rule on it. But as I have already pointed out, the NI4D hinders our courts.
Now suppose the residents of Alabama pass an initiative that states California shall not recognize gay marriage. The proposal wouldn’t be a federal proposal because it only operates on the state level. Yet, what say should Alabama have in what happens in California? I don’t see anything in the NI4D that prevents this.
Moving onto Jpritikin’s next point, yes, the people ---in their natural state --- already have these powers. However, since the People of the United States chose to form the US government some 200 years ago, we voluntarily gave up those powers and entered into a social contract. In order to get some of those powers back, we either have to work within the framework of that contract (Article 5) or we have to rip that contract up and start anew.
Thank you for your well thought out rebuttal. It can only be a benefit for all of us to engage in this discussion. I would also like to offer my apologies for the length of this rebuttal. I tried my best to be as concise as possible, but given the topic at hand, it proved too difficult.
I would like to note that this has been discussed at some length at Senator Gravel’s website. I mention this, because some of your points were raised there.
http://www.mikegravel.us/?q=node/1945
1) I think that you have misinterpreted my argument here. I pointed out that the 2nd sentence of the Preamble of the Democracy Act states:
“We asserted this power in our Declaration of Independence and in the ratification of our Constitution.”
The Ratification Article of the Constitution, Article 7, states the following:
“The Ratification of the Conventions of nine States, shall be sufficient for the Establishment of this Constitution between the States so ratifying the Same.”
I don’t think it’s plausible to think that you can enact a direct democracy via assertion.
There is nothing, asserted or otherwise, in the Constitution that permits changing how our government functions by a majority vote of registered voters. At best, you could argue that this is a radical interpretation of the 9th Amendment, an interpretation that I doubt the Supreme Court would find agreeable. The manner by which an amendment can be made to the US Constitution is pretty clear. Article 5 covers this. Either two-thirds of Congress and the States or three-fourths of the States.
2) The Electoral Trust, like Congress, is a representative body. It should be clear to everyone the deficiencies of representative government. It seems foolish to me to think that the Electoral Trust wouldn’t have the same deficiencies. The Sergeant of Arms, unlike the Electoral Trust, is not elected. This too will be discussed at more length below.
3) The nature of power needs to be understood here. The old cliché is that power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. I would say that the degree of corruption is equally proportional to the degree of power. With that in mind, the more participatory the NI4D, the greater the degree the distribution of power is to our citizens.
We should also note, that it is extraordinarily rare for dictators and tyrants to voluntarily cede their power. Power is an elixir and it’s quite addictive. For those who have it, they will not give it up without a struggle. That is true of a single powerful person, such as a President, or a group of people, such as an economic class or a legislative body.
What we should also note is that the NI4D is a powerful tool. It grants extraordinary powers to those who participate in it. Any glance at the expenditures needed to field Congressional candidates should bear this out. The ability to write legislation is power. For those who have it, they will not be comfortable granting that power to others, as it diminishes their monopoly on that power.
Since that is the case, the NI4D establishes a set of incentives by requiring only registered voters be allowed to participate. The incentive set up is to make it difficult to allow people to register to vote. How long would it take for an initiative to pass that would require a large sum of money in order to register as a participant in the NI4D?
For this reason, section 3-A of the NI4D sets up a very scary precedent, one that could possibly even threaten your right to vote for our elected officials.
My proposal, Article Eight, completely bypasses this entire problem in Section 1, Clause 1:
“The House of the People shall be composed of the entirety of We the People.”
The only requirement to participate in The House of the People is to be 1) a US citizen for 10 years (which would include your childhood if you’re a natural-born citizen), and 2) be at least 18 years old.
4) Yes, it is bad to be nitpicky. One of the brilliant things our Founding Fathers did was to establish a method by which our Constitution could change with the times. For that reason, our Constitution established what is now the oldest government in the world, despite the fact that we’re a relatively young nation.
This genius was achieved a few ways. 1) it established a method by which the Constitution could be amended. 2) it gave the three branches of government some flexibility on how it will conduct its business. For instance, Article 1, Section 5, Clause 2 establishes that:
”Each House may determine the Rules of its Proceedings“
Unlike the NI4D, the Constitution allows Congress to change how they will conduct business. If some part of the procedure becomes a hindrance, Congress can change it. The NI4D doesn’t permit this. Instead the authors of the NI4D already establishes that procedure. Should the NI4D be amended into the US Constitution, changing that procedure would be as difficult as enacting the NI4D in the first place.
This is why my proposal, Article Eight, borrowing language directly from the Constitution, states in Clause 1, Section 6:
”The House of the People shall chuse the manner by which they will conduct its Rules of Proceedings”.
5) The problem with Section 3-C is precisely that it pertains to particular jurisdictions. There is nothing that I can see in the NI4D that prevents a the Electoral Board to submit an initiative that is federal in scope to the city-level in order to manipulate the initiative process if the Board members happen to be opposed to that particular initiative. Giving the Electoral Trust the ability to rewrite the Title and Summary of a particular initiative is a very effective way to railroading an initiative that the Electoral Board may happen to not like. This isn’t a very far-fetched idea, as anyone familiar with The PATRIOT Act should know.
6) This has been discussed at some length at Mike Gravel’s website, the URL of which I furnished above. My argument isn’t that a 5000 word limit is too low. My argument is that it’s an unnecessary restriction. Furthermore, I would argue that such a limit contradicts the First Amendment protection of free speech. People have the right not to be concise. An initiative that is not concise should be weighed by the People when considering a particular proposal, and in my view should be weighed negatively. However, that doesn’t change the fact that an initiative could be a good one that the People would be in favor of that goes over the 5000 word limit. A practical example would be an overhaul of our nation’s tax code. And not to belabor the point, but my proposal, Article Eight, using the same word-count criteria that you established is 446 words.
7) I don’t see what the purpose is of having a two year limit for an initiative. I wouldn’t see how an initiative would circulate for 50 years. Quite frankly, I couldn’t see one circulating for 2 years either, but isn’t the point of this proposal to give the People the power to govern themselves how they see fit? If we tell them extensively how they can govern themselves, are we really setting up a real direct democracy with the NI4D?
8) Section 3-E-2 demonstrates to me one of the most flawed and dangerous aspects of the NI4D. It allows the Electoral Trust to pass binding national laws based upon poll results. This, by definition, isn’t democratic. It is a classic example of tyranny of the minority. Yes, the Electoral Trust is permitted to approve of who will be conducting that poll. That means that the Electoral Trust can get laws passed by itself with a little bit of innovation and a lack of scruples. A cursory look at what happens in Washington demonstrates that this would likely happen.
So here’s an example of how this might work. Suppose a group of jackasses get elected to the Electoral Trust. And suppose they want to get legislation passed to, I dunno, increase the pay of Electoral Trust members to 5 billion dollars a year. In order to get this passed an Electoral Trust member can write the proposed legislation himself, hire a push-polling company to conduct a misleading poll, wording it in order to trick people into approving it, and voilà! the Electoral Trust members are suddenly handsomely rich.
9) Nothing precludes the People from calling their own townhall meeting to debate an initiative, so long as it is in agreement with “the policies and procedures established by the Electoral Trust.” Suppose the Electoral Trust establishes policies and procedures that initiatives cannot be debated publicly without their consent. Then what happens? Would the Supreme Court have the ability to rule that this is a violation of the First Amendment protection to peacefully petition your government for a redress of grievances?
10) This was also covered at some length at Mike Gravel’s website, which I noted above. Giving the Electoral Trust the ability to rewrite an initiative essentially gives the Electoral Trust the ability to act as lawmakers. Would they “clean up” the language of a poorly drafted pieced of legislation, or would they re-write it to their own desires? The nature of power indicates that they would do the later.
11) Asking the legislative for an advisory vote only seems to me to introduce far too much red tape to the entire process. It raises a lot of problems. 1) if the passage of an initiative requires a legislative advisory vote, then what happens if the legislative refuses to take up the vote? Does the initiative then die? If not, is the relevant legislative body being told how to conduct their schedule? 2) Allowing the legislative to have an advisory vote could help derail important reforms that are needed.
Here’s how this could play out. Suppose there’s an initiative proposed to completely eliminate arsenic from our drinking water. It comes before Congress for an advisory vote. Congress sees this initiative, and knows that it is strongly supported by the people. This bothers a lot of members of Congress, who are in the pockets of polluters. So Congress passes a law that limits the levels of arsenic in our drinking water from say 800 parts per billion to 500 parts per billion. Once passed, Congress holds a big press conference saying that they have eliminated arsenic from our drinking water. The public momentum for this initiative dies and we still have arsenic in our drinking water.
12) Yes, I am saying that under Section 3-K the Electoral Trust can indefinitely suspend votes on certain initiatives. Suppose there’s an initiative that the Electoral Trust doesn’t want passed. Then all they have to do is schedule it for a vote 2 years and 1 day into the future. Yes, the Electoral Trust is required to conduct the initiative process chronologically. But then again, under the US Constitution, only Congress has the right to declare war. What prevents the Electoral Trust from scheduling all initiatives two years into the future?
13) Before I begin, let me suggest some reading here. A couple years ago two researchers, Conradt and Roper, wrote an interesting study on democratic decision making in herds of animals. Their study was published in the journal Nature. It can be found here.
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v421/n6919/full/nature01294.html
Now, first we should understand precisely how minority rights are protected in this country. To understand that, we have to understand that our government is a constitutionally-limited republican democracy.
The Founders were influenced by many of the enlightenment thinkers such as Hume and Rousseau. Rousseau noted in The Social Contract that the natural state of man is complete freedom. By the laws of nature man is free. Free to murder, rape, and destroy. Of course, this is hardly practical. So, as Rousseau reasoned, government is set up as a contract among the people to limit certain rights, such as the right to murder, in order to enhance the safety and well being of a People. The Founders believed this was precisely the case, which is why our Constitution begins with the words “We the People”. What the Founders wanted to prevent was a government that had the ability to limit certain rights which they deemed “inalienable”. This is why, if you read the First Amendment, it does not say that The People have the right to free speech. Instead it prevents government from taking that right away with the words, “Congress shall make no law…”
However, Congress could pass a law prohibiting free speech. That is precisely why we have a court system. Our courts act as the protectors of our rights. The judges are free from need to be re-elected by lifetime appointments, and therefore are far less prone to political corruption than Congress, who needs to always come back for campaign funds. This hasn’t always worked well, but it has worked reasonably well over the last 230 some years that we have been a nation.
We should note that the only way to bypass the Supreme Court, once it has ruled a law unconstitutional is by amending the Constitution. This, of course, is a task that requires a supermajority. A supermajority is a very good protector of minority rights. While it is quite easy to get 50%+1 to agree with something that is for the moment politically popular, it’s a lot harder to get two thirds or three quarters to go along with it. A simple majority is a very easy thing to accomplish, even if it’s broken up into two elections. That poses a danger.
If the philosophy of democracy could be defined with just a few words, I would say it would have to be “two heads are better than one.” When it comes to very grave and serious decisions, I want as many heads as possible to agree before moving forward.
14) Section 3-N states:
“After an initiative has been enacted into statute law, courts, when requested, may determine the constitutionality of the law.”
In any case, I should note that the language of the NI4D only allows the courts to review the constitutionality of enacted initiatives when it requests it. Which leads me to wonder, who grants those requests? The Electoral Trust? The NI4D is quite hostile to judicial review throughout the entire language of the NI4D. Given how the court’s function is to protect minority rights, this makes me a bit suspicious, if not weary.
15) Why should any money be donated to finance the campaigns of any initiative? It can only corrupt the process. Why not give free and equal public access to all proposed initiatives?
16) If any American doesn’t have a mistrust of representative government by now, then I fear they’re simply gullible, aren’t paying attention, or both. As the Electoral Trust is a representative body, then it’s worthy of an equal distrust. While the inexperience of a newly elected Electoral Board member is something to consider, that weighs far less heavy on my conscious than having the ability to throw all the bums out at once. There is no real on-the-job training for most high ranking government positions, and this fact has rarely hindered this nation.
I have already noted that the Electoral Board does indeed write law, if it so chooses. But that’s avoiding the point. The point is that when you have a large constituent to representative ratio, then you get a less responsive (and thus less democratic) government.
Let me explain this in more detail. We have 435 members of the House of Representatives. 100 members of the Senate. 1 President. Who do you have more sway with? This varies depending on where you live, and how densely populated your part of the country is, but with about 300 million Americans, and 435 Congressmen, then you’d get about 690,000 constituents per Congressman. That means, in order to influence your Congressman you have to compete with 690,000 other persons. Now let’s look at Senators. I have no idea what a median state population might be, but I would guess that most states have over 2 million residents. With 2 senators, that’s a million other constituents you have to compete with. When it comes down to the President, it’s your voice out of 300 million others. At that level, you basically have no say at all.
For this reason, the House of Representatives has always been more responsive to the People than the Senate. I would say the Senate is hardly responsive to the People at all. If you compare that to the Electoral Trust, which only has 53 members, and who are representing an equal number of people that the Senate does, then by definition, the Electoral Trust would be about half as responsive to the People as the US Senate. What their duties entail is besides the point. What’s important is that structurally, the Electoral Trust is less democratic than the US Senate.
17) I don’t think “compromise” is the word you’re looking for. I think “flaw” is more appropriate. The last thing anyone should be doing when setting up a new way to run our government is to look at rosy scenarios. After all, that worked great in Iraq, didn’t it? Instead it makes sense to think in terms of worse case scenarios. Once you figure that out, you can better ameliorate those flaws, which one would hope might avoid disaster for our posterity. But worse then rosy scenarios, the last thing you should do is put “trust” in your elected officials. After all, if our elected representatives were trust worthy, then there would be no need to give the people law making ability in the first place.
18) It makes me uneasy to think that the Interim Board set up to establish the NI4D would be composed of the very same people who manage our elections. If the NI4D had been established in 2000, that would mean Katherine Harris would be a member of the Interim Board representing the state of Florida. In 2004 it would mean that Ken Blackwell would be the Interim Board member representing Ohio. Imagine, the very same people who have given us the fraud of electronic voting machines would be the very same people who would be establishing the NI4D. If that doesn’t give you a moment’s pause, then you’re a far more trusting person than I. I would argue that you lend that trust at your own peril.
19) While I will acknowledge that the term “Chief Executive Officer” isn’t nearly as important as some of the other issues I have raised, it does concern me. The terms “President”, “Prime Minister”, “Executive Secretary”, “Director” or “Chairman” would work fine. There are a host of titles that would be appropriate. But what concerns me about using the corporate term “Chief Executive Officer”, is that it would create a kind of corporate mentality or atmosphere in the Electoral Trust. I think it is also demonstrative of the mindset of the author(s) of the NI4D. Corporate structures, by definition, are hierarchical and anti-democratic. Using what I see as anti-democratic terminology to establish a supposedly direct democratic form of government is ironic at best, fraudulent at worse.
20) If you had two options, which one of these would you choose? Option one, you can only get what you want by stating what you don’t want. Option two, you can state what you do want, and can state what you don’t want. Which option gives you more choice? There is no good reason not to be able to elect the CEO of the Electoral Trust. The only purpose would be to limit the power of the American People.
21) My point was that Section 4-D-3 establishes that a election for the Electoral Trust CEO wouldn’t even happen in the case of death or vacancy of the CEO.
22) I’m certainly no lawyer, but I have never heard of any US court ruling on a law that hasn’t been enacted yet. This seems like a very poor excuse to include such language. What Section 4-F-1 actually does is give the Electoral Board members the ability to violate the law, on the basis that the NI4D supercedes US Law.
23) I’m not sure what’s confusing about the concern I raised in Section 4-F-4. If the Electoral Board has the ability to set the policies and procedures for how an initiative is to be presented to the public, than that gives the Electoral Board the ability to frame initiatives they don’t like negatively.
Suppose there’s an initiative proposed to requires all Electoral Board members to list their business investments online so the People will be aware of any possible conflict of interests. The Electoral Board would name this initiative the “Boneheaded Initiative”.
24) This has already been covered above.
25) Section 4-F-6 gives the Electoral Board the ability to decide how their own members will be elected. Imagine if you could decide for yourself under what circumstances your employer could fire you.
26) Under the US Constitution, only the House of Representatives are allowed to allocate tax payer funds. The NI4D allows itself to allocate it’s own funds, a power that the Senate and the President doesn’t have. Given all the other flaws in the NI4D, I think this is a dangerous idea.
27) The NI4D is not a contract. Telling the US courts precisely how they are permitted to rule when it comes to the NI4D not only constrains our nation’s judicial branch, but is extraordinarily arrogant. It is saying that the Courts have the right to rule on the Constitutionality of any particular section of the NI4D, but that the courts have no right to rule on the Constitutionality of the NI4D itself.
I don’t care what the inspiration was for setting up the Electoral Trust. If you trust representative government, then you shouldn’t support the NI4D, as there is no need for it, since Congress is already a representative government body. If you don’t trust representative government, then you shouldn’t support the NI4D, as it sets up a whole new representative government bureaucracy.
As for my own proposal, Article Eight, Jpritikin raises a criticism that Article Eight only operates at the federal level. I structured this for reasons of simplicity and strategy. Once Article Eight is enacted, a law can be passed by the People allowing state and local jurisdictions to enact their own direct democratic forms of government. However, since the circumstances of each state differs, it makes sense to allow the citizens of each state to choose how to establish their own local direct democratic governments.
The strategic reason for this goes right back to the nature of power. A tyrant will never voluntarily give up their own power. However, one tyrant might be willing to give away the power of another tyrant if it has almost no effect on them. Which brings us back to how all this could be realized. It has been argued by NI4D proponents that Article 7 of the US Constitution sets up a precedent for enacting the NI4D. In the first part of my video, I showed how this was not the case, simply because Article 7 includes the words “this Constitution”. For this reason, the only way I can see ourselves establishing a form of direct democracy is via Article 5.
Now, the requirements of Article 5 is pretty clear. Get two thirds of Congress and the states to go along with an amendment, or get three quarters of the states to go along with an amendment. The three quarters route bypasses Congress all together. For that reason, it’s our best shot. State legislators might be more willing to give away the power of members of the US Congress, but they would hardly be willing to give away their own power. Therefore, Article Eight only functions on the federal level.
Which brings me to what I’ve identified as the 28th problem with the NI4D. While it does function on the state and local level, it doesn’t prevent, as far as I can tell, one jurisdiction from interfering with another.
Our Founders were wise in establishing the interstate commerce clause of the Constitution. If two states are dealing with commerce with each other, the federal government has the ability to step in and control what was going on. If the legislature of one state passed a law that would interfere with another state, the federal government could step in, or the courts could rule on it. But as I have already pointed out, the NI4D hinders our courts.
Now suppose the residents of Alabama pass an initiative that states California shall not recognize gay marriage. The proposal wouldn’t be a federal proposal because it only operates on the state level. Yet, what say should Alabama have in what happens in California? I don’t see anything in the NI4D that prevents this.
Moving onto Jpritikin’s next point, yes, the people ---in their natural state --- already have these powers. However, since the People of the United States chose to form the US government some 200 years ago, we voluntarily gave up those powers and entered into a social contract. In order to get some of those powers back, we either have to work within the framework of that contract (Article 5) or we have to rip that contract up and start anew.
