Well, in support of my do away with the Senate idea, my point is that it is undemocratic, with smaller states controlling a disproportionate share of the power and larger states having less power. I’ll agree that the actual abuses are less than the theoritical possibilities, and our Senate has frequently acted as a saucer for cooling of tensions. But the House has a lot of short termed people who know that the Senate is there to prevent their antics. My objection isn’t to the inherent conservatism of everything going through two houses, but that the Senate is not proportional based on population. While this was absolutely necessary to get our Constitution enacted, it is fundamentally undemocratic and unnecessary.
I’d expand on the “Right to Privacy” amendment and have an amendment prohibiting the criminalization of any “victimless” crime or the granting of a government monopoly on any commercial activity. Hookers, drugs, and gambling for everybody! And no socialism either.
I’d want an amendment basically prohibiting deficit spending. I’d only allow it under extreme circumstances and require something like a 80% majority of both houses. I’d have the same amendment prohibit zero-line budgeting. And just to make it really radical, I’d prohibit fiat currency.
I’d have an amendment making former Presidents Senators for life.
I’d have an amendment requiring Gary Larson and Bill Waterson to start drawing comic strips again.
I agree with the previous posters on the right to privacy and the individual right to keep and bear arms, and that if you’re going to list individual reasons why people mustn’t be discriminated against, you should include sexual orientation.
I’d make the freedom of religion bit a lot broader and clearer, to include separation of church and state, and freedom from religion.
In making up your new amendments, people might want to consider that it is the very vagueness of the Constitution that has given it the flexibility to stick around for 200+ years. Specifics might very well be a bad thing.
Enderw24, you have a cite for that? Were you friends with the Fathers? Did you know them personally? How do you know what they would or would not have done? I hate those sorts of arguments: “Well, if the Founding Fathers had only known that this or that was going to happen, surely they would have done things my way.”
DPWhite how is the Senate undemocratic? We live in a confederation of states. The Constitution is based on that idea. The House is where the popular vote comes in, the Senate is where the states get together. Do some people get “more of a vote” in the Senate? Sure, but I think that is one of the best guarantees we have for making sure minority opinions are heard instead of just steamrolled over.
Also, Enderw24 what is so confusing about the 7th amendment? “In suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury shall be otherwise reexamined in any court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law.” Sounds pretty straightforward to me.
You’d like to think that, wouldn’t you? Everyone would like to think that. But it isn’t. Because for some reason the Justices decided that things wouldn’t be simple. They had to decide if it was a legal argument or an equitable argument. And before that they had to decide what the Founding Fathers would have considered a legal argument or an equitable argument. And what did the founding fathers think? Hell if I know. Hell if you know. That’s where the problem lies. That’s what you were complaining about earlier Neurotik! No one knows! But we all hum a few bars and try to fake it.
Well, I’ve never been in a Constitutional law class where they go over lots and lots of cases and stuff, so I don’t know what kind of arguments they had over it. You may very well be right.
I shall ask around. 
Oooh! Good one! Add Berke Breathed, too!
I would like to see full constitutional rights given to only those who are citizens of the United States, whether by birth or by going through the full process of obtaining citizenship. Illegal aliens, visitors, visa jumpers, terrorists, leaches, etc. could have only the rights afforded in the Code of Military Justice.
Oh, and the usual exemption for foreign ambassadors, except for a provision that allows any citizen to punch any ambassador in the nose for repeated traffic or parking violations.
I’m confused as to this “right to privacy” thing. Is this more like the “right to commit slightly illegal acts without anyone watching”??
I mean, we have an amendment against illegal searching. Is the whole thing a “I should be able to speed if no one’s around” approach?
We have a certain amount of privacy by being a part of the large american population. Worst case scenario: a video camara is placed in everyone’s houses, right? Well, they can’t pay special attention to everyone- it’s not possible. So even in that respect, you do have privacy in the fact that you’re a face in the crowd.
I don’t know what kind of privacy you’re looking for.
Poly, you still here?
Naturally, I favor scrapping the whole thing and replacing it with enough to define a libertarian monarchy with separated arbitration and no legislation, plus a single law: Every citizen shall be guaranteed freedom from coercion. The whole thing would be one page, max.
Little Nemo, your idea abour former presidents serving in the Senate is interesting, to say the least. As the body that has to approve treaties and presidential nominees, the upper chamber might benefit from some presidential perspective.
But I don’t think we should just say any former president. For one, I think presidents who left due to resignation or impeachment conviction shouldn’t be eligible.
As long as we’re keeping presidential term limits around (which I think we shouldn’t), I think such a measure should be limited to presidents who served at least one and a half terms + 1 day (allowing vice presidents who became president after less than a half term to share in the privelege.)
I’m not saying I support the idea… I’m still undecided about that. But if we went ahead with it, I think that’s how I’d tweak with it.
Great stuff, everyone, and thanks. It’s interesting that many want to tweak the Electoral College idea rather than going for direct popular election of the President.
I concur with the need for the Right to Privacy amendment, though I think Justice Douglas’s metaphors unfortunately cloud a legitimate principle. Quite simply, to ensure that any right may be duly exercised there are strings attached. A law that permitted a given group of persons to exercise their constitutionally guaranteed freedom of speech, but only alone in soundproofed rooms, would, I think, be unconstitutional in that the right to freedom of speech logically includes the right to be heard by willing listeners, even though the latter is not explicitly guaranteed.
This is a significant part of why James Madison, who was the principal writer of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, was originally opposed to a Bill of Rights: He was firmly convinced that spelling out specific rights would lead to the conclusion that they were the only rights guaranteed. A wide range of Founding Fathers agreed, resulting in the Ninth Amendment. (Bork’s pious references to “original intent” coupled with his rejection of the Ninth as meaningless highlight his constitutional bankruptcy.)
Chance:
I suspect you want to repeal the 22nd, not the 25th, which is the one that deals with vacancies in the Vice Presidency and what to do when a President is disabled, among other things.
Little Nemo, I trust you’re aware that the ex-Presidents-in-Senate idea has been around for a while, and that ex-Presidents were given the “privilege of the floor” of the Senate (voice but no vote whenever they choose to exercise it) back in the early Sixties. Harry Truman was the first President to do so, during Kennedy’s term IIRC.
Add to my list a line-item veto for the President.
I also tend to agree that a little vagueness is a good thing as it allows the Constitution to bend and flex with the times. Still, as already mentioned, a few bits could definitely use clarification (‘right to bear arms’ raising its head again…sorry erislover but it isn’t as clearcut as you seem to think it is).
Agree completely. Let’s remove any reference to the word “God” or a “Supreme being”. Santa Clause and fairy tales are fine for children. They have no business being in the constitution. Maybe if we remove this stuff from the constitution, it would help remove the tax exempt status of the church and religious propaganda that is an affront to “Eradication of Ignorance”.
Maybe references to God shouldn’t be in the Constitution but I don’t see how the rest follows. There are thousands of tax-exempt organizations in the US most of which have no mention in the Constitution. I don’t see how removing God from the COnstitution should affect the tax status of religious organizations.
As to the propaganda I would imagine that’d fall under free speech which I think everyone is happy to leave in the Constitution. In short, they are free to write or speak the propaganda and you are free to ignore them.
Maybe that eradication ought to start right there in your own head. Nevermind the long list of great thinkers throughout history who have been people of faith. Nevermind the bottomless ignorance that equates God with Santa Claus. All that aside, do you seriously believe that Polycarp, Triskadecamus, I, and the other people of faith here at SDMB are childish believers in fairy tales? Inquiring minds want to know.
That had bothered me too, Lib.
One Cell, are you seriously advocating that “freedom of religion” means the right to disbelieve as you do? I’ve seen similar arguments made by strong fundamentalists that “since the Bible is true and God is supreme, everyone should be free to worship Him in their own way, so long as they acknowledge that.” But I never expected to hear the same thesis from an atheist.
I presume the Santa Clause is the one about “provide for the general welfare”? 
And are you positive you know more than the deists (not Christians) who included those references to “Nature and to Nature’s God” and such in the Preamble?
Not sure where you’re going with this, but I assume it is another way to say you don’t want churches to have tax exemption. I’d also quote OneCell about this, but his post doesn’t deserve repeating.
The Founding Fathers had great concerns about the role of religion in their government. Many had fled from religiously oppressive regimes, and wanted freedom from a government sponsored religion, as well as freedom to pratice their own religion. The debates that followed ended up with the enactment of the Establishment Clause (Government can’t establish a religion), and the Free Exercise of Religion (Government can’t attack religion either). These two parts of the First Amendment quite often end up working in opposition to each other.
As former Chief Justice John Marshall once said, “The power to tax is the power to destroy.” I for one do not want the government to have the power to tax religions, because they could easily decide to tax them out of existance. The
Look. All I am saying is that people have the right to believe in god, or not to believe in it. The constitution should provide the right to all, rather than taking sides.
By implementing the concept of “God” in the constitution, you are inherently taking side in favor of one group.
I have no problem with people “having faith” or believing in anything they want to believe in, including fairy tales and Disneyland. “Great thinkers” can continue having their “Great thoughts” without the word “God” appearing in the constitution.
How about “One Nation, Free of Ignorance, …”, as opposed to “One Nation, Under God,…” ?
I would like to see an amendment that prohibited laws for which there is no direct victim (prostitution, drug use, etc.)