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Why Bother With the Constitution?

By Doug Bandow on 2.23.09 @ 8:19AM

I believe it was Joe Sobran who once said that the Constitution poses no threat to our form of government. Certainly that is true with the plan to grant the District of Columbia a real, i.e., voting congressman. Reports the Washington Times:

Buoyed by the election of President Obama and additional Democratic gains in Congress, backers of a bill granting the District full representation in the House perceive Senate action this weekas the turning point in a decades-long quest.

"If it goes through the Senate, I think it will become law," said former Virginia Rep. Tom Davis, a moderate Republican who served roughly 14 years in Congress and backed the city's effort.

The District of Columbia House Voting Rights Act of 2009 is expected to be debated Monday in the Senate, then come up for a crucial preliminary vote Tuesday. A final Senate vote could come before Friday.

The bill provides one full House vote for the heavily Democratic District and an additional seat for Republican-leaning Utah in an attempt at a bipartisan compromise on the issue. In 2007, a similar bill fell three votes shy of advancing in the Senate after passing the House on a 241-177 vote.

Now, one can sympathize with people who have no voting representatives in Congress (either House or Senate). But the best answer would be to carve out a much smaller federal government enclave and retrocede the rest of the District back to Maryland, from whence it came more than two centuries ago. Then residents could vote for both House and Senate members.

However, the plan before Congress is flatly unconstitutional. Article I, Section 2 states: "The House of Representatives shall be composed of Members chosen every second Year by the People of the several States." Note that the Constitution says "states." Not "districts." Not "cities." Not "thingies." Not "geographical designations which we want to treat like states." But "states."

But then, as Joe Sobran noted, the Constitution really doesn't have much to do with the operation of the U.S. government any more.

View all comments (72) | Leave a comment

Alan Brooks| 2.23.09 @ 9:01AM

Joe Sobran is right.
what ever happened to Madisonism? or at least '50s liberalism, if nothing else.

PJ Doland| 2.23.09 @ 10:06AM

While we're at it, we also need to get rid of the voting rights for Virginia, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and Kentucky since they are commonwealths and not states.

Martin Owens| 2.23.09 @ 1:18PM

Post -Constitutional America has been a fact of life for years. Where has everyone been?

Zach| 2.23.09 @ 6:01PM

As a Utah resident, I can say we don't want it. We get a new seat once the new census goes through anyway (provided Obama's team doesn't fudge the numbers). So not only is it un-Constitutional, it's a net loss for Republicans.

citizenw| 2.24.09 @ 10:14AM

Founder George Mason said, "No free government, or the blessings of liberty can be preserved to any people, but by frequent recurrence to fundamental principles."
James Madison said "The people were in fact, the fountain of all power, and by resorting to them, all difficulties were got over. They could alter constitutions as they pleased. It was a principle in the Bills of rights, that first principles might be resorted to."
Our Constitution is a document written in an attempt to "form a more perfect Union". One of the basic, bedrock fundamental principles upon which democracy and its variations (such as a democratic republic) are based is "Consent of the Governed". Consent is determined by majority consensus, with special protections afforded to the rights of minorities. One of the most basic implications of this approach is that "the people" consist of ALL of the people. If a minority of the people are excluded from even participating in the process of decisionmaking by the majority, that exclusion tends to erode the legitimacy of the entire system.
Such is the situation of the long-suffering residents of the District of Columbia. Excluded from participation in the national decisionmaking process nearly from the begining of the Republic by the tyranny of the majority (those living in the fifty states), their exclusion (along with the now-corrected one-time exclusion of blacks, women, and young adults under the age of 21) has tended to erode the legitimacy of the rule of law, under self-evident, bedrock, fundamental democratic principles such as Consent of the Governed.
Consent of the Governed has not been afforded denizens of the District since 1801. The current Constitution is hardly even their Constitution today, since they have not been afforded an opportunity to participate in decisionmaking that resulted in Amendments 12 through 27 (since 1801). The Courts, likewise, are hardly even their courts, since they have not had representatives with an opportunity to participate in decisions (advise and consent) regarding their staffing and operation, since 1801. Finally, the Congress is hardly even their Congress, since they have had no vote, and precious little voice, in either chamber, since 1801.
The denizens of DC, as part of the original thirteen colonies, are unrebuttably the same posterity, the same progeny, as those currently residing in the fifty states, for whom, as an indivisible Nation, the Founders pledged their "Lives, their Fortunes, and their Sacred Honor" to secure Liberty. Of that there can be no argument. Other territories (Puerto Rico, Pacific Islands, etc have a more tenuous claim on that position).
The Declaratory Act of 1766 was an attempt by the British nation to arrogate to itself an Absolute Power over an unrepresented minority "in all cases whatsoever". Similarly, the District Clause attempts to arrogate to the American nation Absolute Power over an unrepresented minority "in all cases whatsoever". Both cases are highly rebuttable, since both seek tyrannical Absolute Power by the majority (and we know what Absolute Power does) over an unrepresented minority. The bedrock principle of "Consent of the Governed" is violated by such unwarranted assertions.
"VI. That elections of members to serve as representatives of the people, in Assembly, ought to be free; and that all men having sufficient evidence of permanent common interest with and attachment to, the community, have the right of suffrage, and cannot be taxed or deprived of their property for public uses without their own consent, or that of their representatives so elected, nor bound by any law to which they have not, in like manner, assented for the public good."
Virginia Declaration of Rights, June, 1776
Continued, persistent violation of this fundamental, bedrock, first principle of modern democratic government undermines and erodes the very legitimacy of the rule of government over those excluded from participation in our representative, democratic, republican system of government. The nation must address this deficiency in our Constitution, with the goal of forming a More Perfect Union.

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