New Constitutional Convention Discussion

[minionofmidas]

Pete said it would take something like ten amendments to fix it. Why don't we redraft it, keep what is alright and finish it with one thing instead of ten. Either way, the way we conduct Constitutional Amendment votes needs to change. Post the vote in the thread like you would for an election.

Now this is a change that I'd support enthusiastically.
Given that current praxis is based on precedent and an unclearly worded constitutional provision, it could probably be done by a simple law.

[minionofmidas]

Now this is a change that I'd support enthusiastically.
Given that current praxis is based on precedent and an unclearly worded constitutional provision, it could probably be done by a simple law.

You cannot change the way that Constitutional Amendments are voted on by simple statute - whatever the Constitution says outranks that Statute. The Senate has already imposed an arbitrary time limit on constitutional amendment public polls of one week via an SPR; I don't know where they managed to get this authority from - but the Constituion is not decided upon by Senate Procedural Resolutions.

Due to the Constitution's silence, all votes on amendments remain theoretically open forever until they have gained a majority of ALL registered voters. Its too much work to bother to check, but I doubt that all if any of the present amendments "passed" have actually gained a majority of registered voters. This causes a pretty extreme problem which can only be resolved by overthrowing the Constitution and writing a new one.

Well, in Germany, when the Constitution provides only a skeleton on how to do things, it's the lawmakers' job to beef it up.
The constitution talks of a "public poll". Nobody knows what a "public poll" is - I guess even at the time nobody except maybe DemRepDan knew what it was supposed to mean.