# Are we paying the price for such an inexperienced President? **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [December 29, 2012, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-we-paying-the-price-for-such-an-inexperienced-president/645510 "2012-12-29T19:44:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 8
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2013, 10:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-we-paying-the-price-for-such-an-inexperienced-president/645510/141 "2013-01-03T22:39:03Z")
> [@Bookkeeper](#): > > It looks to me like your Congress already has the ability to do impose a common national election process similar to most other First World countries, but lacks the political will. Right. Congress has the political power to fix this. It will be difficult to convince them it’s in their best interests to do so. ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2013, 12:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-we-paying-the-price-for-such-an-inexperienced-president/645510/142 "2013-01-04T12:50:15Z")
> [@Bookkeeper](#): > > Article 1 Section 4 Clause 1 > _The Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by Law make or alter such Regulations, except as to the Places of chusing Senators._ > > It looks to me like your Congress already has the ability to do impose a common national election process similar to most other First World countries, but lacks the political will. I’m not convinced that drawing the districts is included in the “Times, Places, and Manner of holding Elections”. Congress may specify hours or methodology, I don’t see where it has the power to tell the state how to draw the districts. ---
**Author:** ![syncrolecyne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f08c70/32.png) [@syncrolecyne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/syncrolecyne)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2013, 7:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-we-paying-the-price-for-such-an-inexperienced-president/645510/143 "2013-05-11T07:09:30Z")
Nothing much to add, other than I am struck that most of our recent presidents have been similarly “inexperienced.” The last president that I would consider truly experienced on assuming the presidency was the first president Bush. We have had many governors and legislators with no real foreign policy experience, no senior military or diplomatic experience, and relatively brief terms in domestic politics. ---
**Author:** ![Docta\_G](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/2bfe46/32.png) [@Docta\_G](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Docta_G)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2013, 9:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-we-paying-the-price-for-such-an-inexperienced-president/645510/144 "2013-05-11T21:51:22Z")
We’re paying the price for pretty much every president this country has ever had. It’s a dumb world, and the U.S.is its flagship. ---
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2013, 2:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-we-paying-the-price-for-such-an-inexperienced-president/645510/145 "2013-05-12T02:01:15Z")
> [@Docta\_G](#): > > We’re paying the price for pretty much every president this country has ever had. It’s a dumb world, and the U.S.is its flagship. Even Lincoln and FDR? :dubious: ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2013, 2:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-we-paying-the-price-for-such-an-inexperienced-president/645510/146 "2013-05-12T02:03:58Z")
We’re paying the price for today’s Republican party. ---
**Author:** ![Docta\_G](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/2bfe46/32.png) [@Docta\_G](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Docta_G)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2013, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-we-paying-the-price-for-such-an-inexperienced-president/645510/147 "2013-05-12T17:44:15Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > Even Lincoln and FDR? :dubious: I said, “pretty much.” ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2013, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-we-paying-the-price-for-such-an-inexperienced-president/645510/148 "2013-05-12T19:17:29Z")
> [@Lok](#): > > Here in Ohio there was a ballot measure to change the constitution and remove the re-districting power from the legislature and give it to a board that would be non-jpartisan. (And they had a pretty good method to prevent either party gaining control over it.) It was fought, and defeated, on the grounds that it was non-democratic. At least you did better than we did in Florida, in 2006, when the supporters of a similar redistricting-reform amendment ran its language past a team of lawyers, and collected all the necessary petition-signatures, but [the state Supreme Court would not even allow amendment on the ballot.](http://www.tallahassee.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060323/BREAKINGNEWS/603230350&nclick_check=1) (As violating the state constitution’s “single-subject” rule.) Then the supporters came back in 2010 with [two](http://ballotpedia.org/wiki/index.php/Florida_Legislative_District_Boundaries,_Amendment_5_(2010)) [amendments](http://ballotpedia.org/wiki/index.php/Florida_Congressional_District_Boundaries,_Amendment_6_(2010)), got both on the ballot and both passed. These were much weaker than the amendment proposed in 2006, in that they do not take the redistricting process away from the legislature, but simply lay down rules of “fairness” to be followed in the process. Nevertheless, Gov. Scott and the Pubs (and some Dems) have been fighting their implementation tooth and nail ever since. > [@](#): > > \*\*Aftermath > > Gov. Scott pulls back amendments\*\* > > On January 25, 2011 Brian Hughes, a spokesperson for Gov. Rick Scott, confirmed that the governor pulled a request for federal approval of Amendment 5 and Amendment 6. Scott is reported to have acted three days after taking office on January 4, 2011. The paperwork for approval of the measures was filed December 10, 2010 by former Gov. Charlie Crist.[4] > > According to the federal Voting Rights Act, the state of Florida is required to receive “pre-clearance” of changes to its election laws that affect minority rights.[4] > > On Tuesday, January 25 Scott told the news media, “One of the things that we’re looking at is the amendments that were passed, how they’re going to be implemented. We want to make sure that with regard to redistricting, it’s fair, it’s the right way of doing it. So it’s something I’m clearly focused on.”[5] > > “Census data has not been transmitted to the state yet, and the Legislature will not undertake redistricting for months, so this withdrawal in no way impedes the process of redrawing Florida’s legislative and congressional districts,” said Hughes of Scott’s request withdrawal.[4] > > In reaction to the governor’s actions, supporters of the measures said the act was “shameful.” ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2013, 5:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-we-paying-the-price-for-such-an-inexperienced-president/645510/149 "2013-05-17T17:01:15Z")
> [@BobLibDem](#): > > I’m not convinced that drawing the districts is included in the “Times, Places, and Manner of holding Elections”. Congress may specify hours or methodology, I don’t see where it has the power to tell the state how to draw the districts. They can. [QUOTE=Scalia] It is significant that the Framers provided a remedy for such practices in the Constitution. Article I, § 4, while leaving in state legislatures the initial power to draw districts for federal elections, permitted Congress to “make or alter” those districts if it wished. Many objected to the congressional oversight established by this provision. In the course of the debates in the Constitutional Convention, Charles Pinckney and John Rutledge moved to strike the relevant language. James Madison responded in defense of the provision that Congress must be given the power to check partisan manipulation of the election process by the States: “Whenever the State Legislatures had a favorite measure to carry, they would take care so to mould their regulations as to favor the candidates they wished to succeed. Besides, the inequality of the Representation in the Legislatures of particular States, would produce a like inequality in their representation in the Natl. Legislature, as it was presumable that the Counties having the power in the former case would secure it to themselves in the latter. What danger could there be in giving a controuling power to the Natl. Legislature?” 2 Records of the Federal Convention of 1787, pp. 240–241 (M. Farrand ed.1911). Although the motion of Pinckney and Rutledge failed, opposition to the “make or alter” provision of Article I, § 4—and the defense that it was needed to prevent political gerrymandering continued to be voiced in the state ratifying debates. A delegate to the Massachusetts convention warned that state legislatures “might make an unequal and partial division of the states into districts for the election of representatives, or they might even disqualify one third of the electors. Without these powers in Congress, the people can have no remedy; but the 4th section provides a remedy, a controlling power in a legislature, composed of senators and representatives of twelve states, without the influence of our commotions and factions, who will hear impartially, and preserve and restore to the people their equal and sacred rights of election.” Debates on the Federal Constitution 27 (J. Elliot 2d ed. 1876). The power bestowed on Congress to regulate elections, and in particular to restrain the practice of political gerrymandering, has not lain dormant. In the Apportionment Act of 1842, 5 Stat. 491, Congress provided that Representatives must be elected from single-member districts “composed of contiguous territory.” See Griffith 12 (noting that the law was “an attempt to forbid the practice of the gerrymander”). Congress again imposed these requirements in the Apportionment \*\*1776 Act of 1862, 12 Stat. 572, and in 1872 further required that districts “contai[n] as nearly as practicable an equal number of inhabitants,” 17 Stat. 28, § 2. In the Apportionment Act of 1901, Congress imposed a compactness requirement. 31 Stat. 733. The requirements of contiguity, compactness, and equality of population were repeated in the 1911 apportionment legislation, 37 Stat. 13, but were not thereafter continued. Today, only the single-member-district-requirement remains. See 2 U.S.C. § 2c. Recent history, however, attests to Congress’s awareness of the sort of districting practices appellants protest, and of its power under Article I, § 4, to control them. Since 1980, no fewer than five bills have been introduced to regulate gerrymandering in congressional districting. Vieth v. Jubelirer, 541 U.S. 267, 275-77 (2004) [/QUOTE] The Voting Rights Act could not have been passed if Congress didn’t have that authority. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-we-paying-the-price-for-such-an-inexperienced-president/645510.md?page=7)