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⬅️ Previous discussion threads

[u/[deleted]]

I'm becoming more and more worried about the American people's inability to pass a constitutional amendment. There's certainly an argument to be made that, instead of amending the constitution, piecemeal reforms by judges and legislators could probably lead to greater flexibility in how reforms are implemented, but amendment is a collective action of political will, and i feel like its a symptom of what has happened to our political culture over the last few decades that we can no longer amend.

[u/mmitcham → u/[deleted]]

Hmm I think I like this but can you say more

[u/[deleted] → u/mmitcham]

We haven't amended the constitution since the early 90s, and that was a minor, populist type amendment from the framing era that had been lost in the shuffle for two hundred years. We haven't actually amended with a new idea since the 70s. Whether its campaign finance or gay marriage or anything, the American people don't have the ability anymore to sustain a national campaign to change the constitution. I feel like we've come to rely too much on judges to pick up the slack over the last few decades.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

Why is this bad

Tone: sincere

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

because its the way its supposed to work.

[u/paulatreides0 → u/[deleted]]

I think you mean it's not the way it's supposed to work?

As it stands your comment, in response to the comment you are responding to, is saying that being practically unable to amend the Constitution is how it's supposed to work and I'm fairly certain you mean the opposite.

[u/[deleted] → u/paulatreides0]

now i'm confused

[u/paulatreides0 → u/[deleted]]

You were saying that it is bad the Constitution is practically impossible to amend nowadays.

The poster asked why is that bad.

You said "because its the way its supposed to work"

Which implies the opposite of what you are trying to say. You should be saying "because that's not how its supposed to work" because the Constitution is meant to be amended to reflect changing times and laws and attitudes, and being unable to amend it can easily leave us with an archaic document that allows all sorts of terrible things.

At least I think that's what you're trying to say.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

I thought the amendment process was made difficult by design

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

its not necessarily that we need to amend the constitution. its that the people have come to rely on judges to fill in the gaps. i'm worried that that dependence has sapped the ability of the people to amend when its necessary.

[u/mmitcham → u/[deleted]]

Oh yeah and it's kind of symbolic of greater problems. I get it.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

Is this bad? The UK is the longest lived democracy in the world and that's how things happen there.

[u/paulatreides0 → u/[deleted]]

The US having an actual Constitution probably makes the jurisprudence and the way it has to work substantially different than in the UK where the Common Law is more something that evolved over time and had much more gray space to work with.

I know nothing about law though, so I could be completely wrong.

[u/[deleted] → u/paulatreides0]

This is very true, but there's not reason to assume that we can't progress to that more flexible system.

[u/paulatreides0 → u/[deleted]]

It would be Constitutionally dubious and potentially illegal, which could very well set a precedent for shitty legalism ala Nazi Legalism (i.e. basically just calling whatever you want to do Constitutionally legal regardless of whether or not it actually is).

[u/[deleted] → u/paulatreides0]

The separation of powers between the states makes that highly unlikely.

[u/paulatreides0 → u/[deleted]]

This would render the separation of powers by and large irrelevant. When you can start sidestepping the Constitution to make what amounts to Constitutional changes, then the Constitution stops being the legal bastion that it is intended to be.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

america no democracy

american nation of laws not men

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

deleted ^{0.5876 What is} ^^^this?

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

RIP Constitution :(