Seriously, though, the amendment I’d write would look something like this;
“No company or profitable enterprise shall exist in the United States, that does not distribute its revenues, profits, and other gains directly to wages and other emoluments provided to its laborers; nor shall any company or profitable enterprise be owned, in whole or in part, by any person not providing their labor thereunto; nor shall excessive wages and other emoluments be provided to directors or senior executives of such entities relative to other laborers.”
A general voting rights amendment that says every adult citizen shall have a presumed right to vote and they cannot lose their right to vote until the completion of a due process hearing. In other words, no more voter purges right before an election.
The same amendment would restore democracy to our presidential election by abolishing the Electoral College.
While we’re at it, throw in a part that overrides the Buckley decision and makes it clear that money is not a protected form of speech. And a part that requires all voting methods have to meet a standard of transparency and bipartisan monitoring.
You’re going to have to explain that in a way that doesn’t, for example, permit the government to censor the ACLU because they spend money to get their message out and “money is not a protected form of speech”.
Actual speech would still be protected by the first amendment. If the government decides to just ignore the Bill of Rights and begin censoring messages it doesn’t agree with, then I guess it can do so right now. But the issue I’m talking about is money and the pretense that it’s a form of speech.
I have no problem with the government regulating campaign donations. If I hand a politician a five thousand dollar donation, I’m bribing him not communicating an idea to him.
I’ll grant that there could be issues with laws targeting one set of donors and not another. (To use your example, we might see laws preventing the ACLU from donating money but not restricting the NRA.) But again, that’s a problem we face now. I think withdrawing protection from campaign contributions would at least be a step towards leveling the playing field.
Skimming this list just serves as a reminder that America’s huge problems have very little to do with its Constitution or Amendments.
Tellingly, the first suggestion other than OP’s was to strengthen the Second Amendment. Why not emphasize this, the number-one American value, by passing 28th, 29th, 30th, 31st, 32nd, and 33rd Amendments, all different wordings of the right to shoot Gunzz?
You might want to work on the details of this. “The Sovereign State of Alabamy being ordered to send two Democrats to Congress, hereby sends Billy-Joe Reddnekk and Sallie Mae Nig-Rahaighter to be its ‘Democratic’ Congresscritters. We also appoint them to any ‘independent commissions’ them feds impose on us.”
There’s no word limit on Amendments. Shouldn’t this one also make it illegal for Potus not to wear a flag pin in his lapel?
The Constitution makes no mention of holidays - paid, mandated, or otherwise - so this would involve defining a “holiday” and what the Constitution’s or Congress’ establishment of one requires of the states.
I would support a “neutron bomb” amendment to the Constitution that retains the Electoral College for vote allocation purposes, but eliminates the individual electors. No more faithless electors. So the state of Wyoming, by whatever method the legislature directs, transmits the mathematical number 3.
So, for example, if Wyoming enacts a winner take all popular vote and Trump wins, Trump gets 3 EVs.
“Congressional districts shall be allocated to the states based upon the number of Citizens resident in that State.”
Currently, state allocation of districts includes all residents, citizens or no. Maybe I’m naive but I still think that if voting is restricted to citizens than apportionment should be as well. It’s always bothered me a bit that some districts have a much lower proportion of voting citizens than others simply because they’re more international in flavor.
For example, Florida gets 27 congressional districts even though 9% of it’s population is not citizens of the US. Adjust for that and it should have 25 (24.57).
Texas has 36 CD while being 10% non-citizens. Texas is overrepresented in congress - and the electoral college - by 3.6.
I get the reasoning behind allocating by resident. I do. But it’s an inefficiency that bugs me.
We should copy the constitutions of other countries that have more successfully managed democratic outcomes than we have.
I would not be sad to see the institution of the presidency just disappear and instead move to a parliamentary government with the speaker of the house effectively being the prime minister of government.
I would also outlaw gerrymandering and make districting more standardized.
I’m sure I could think of more but this is a good start.
I think the principal is sound. Maybe make it 5 years, maybe add in state legislature or mayoral service. I just want to avoid another disaster like the current one where someone’s first electoral job is president.
46.1% of the voters were deluded enough to vote for Trump - if that was my country I wouldn’t want to bet the farm on whether someone slightly less dysfunctional couldn’t scrape together another 3.9%.
The US system already excludes who you’re allowed to vote for - no under-45s (I believe Pitt the younger was a pretty good British PM …), no-one who wasn’t a citizen when they were born (there’d probably be a President Schwarzenegger right now, and I do believe that would be an improvement ) and no one the country likes enough to have already chosen twice. An experience clause makes at least as much sense as those (and way more than at least one of them)
This isn’t a problem with the Constitution, though.
The great, great majority of proposed changes so far are really terrible ideas for essentially the same reason; they’re an attempt to put current issues, personal opinions and things that should be statutes into a Constitution. Trying to manage things on a really detailed level is a terrible idea in a Constitution. Consider:
I get why people would want this, but it’s not possible. There is no such thing as a universal holiday. Cops, firefighters, soldiers, people who work in hospitals, people who work at 24/7 factories, and a thousand jobs more all have to work holidays. You have to keep the lights on. A Constitutional amendment calling for a universal “mandated paid holiday” in a country where that term is not defined because it isn’t a thing that exists is just moving the argument somewhere else and asking a hundred country to have a hundred arguments over what it means.
The Senate shall consist of three senators from each state, one up for election every two years.
The Representatives shall be elected by the citizens of the state voting at large. No districts. The number of representatives shall be apportioned based on the number of votes cast in the preceding election.
How would that change anything from what the current interpretation of the Second Amendment is today? Wouldn’t you still have the Supreme Court determining whether carry permits or assault weapons bans are “reasonable”?
What is to stop the President from simply not prosecuting himself, the VP, or any cabinet member? He is the executive branch.
Maybe that helps in a Garland situation. Maybe. But a majority of the Senate can always force a vote. What is to stop continuous summary disapprovals when the presidency and the Senate are controlled by different parties?
So the President can be prosecuted by any state official? So if a low-level magistrate from Bumblefuck County, West Virginia issued an arrest warrant against Obama for treason (because he was a secret Muslim or trying to take away guns, whatever) are you suggesting that Obama would have to surrender to the county jail? Could he be held without bail? If he was granted bail, could a condition be that he not leave the state?
S’funny, election days are public holidays in lots of other places.
And all those exceptions (which exist in other countries too) can be serviced by early/mail voting.
Except that last one. That’s not a “have to” situation. Shut the factory down for the day, or if it’s a “can’t stop or we lose months restarting the furnaces” situation, operate it with skeleton staff who get holiday pay and an early voting leave day before then.