Sovereign Citizens And Article V Amendment Convention

Mandeville, LA – Exclusive Transcript – The fact that we’re having this conversation demonstrates yet again that the Constitution is not the work of a God; it’s the work of fallible men.  They did not and could not have possibly foreseen all the damage and usurpations that would be visited upon the compact by designing men.  You have to perceive these things.  Their attitude was correct.  You have to go into the proceedings and legislative sessions or conventions with the foregone conclusion that whoever comes after you are going to try and undo what you did because they desire sex, power, and money.  It’s as simple as that.  Check out today’s transcript for the rest…

 

Begin Mike Church Show Transcript

Mike:  This is Ray in Cincinnati.  Ray, you are on the Mike Church Show.  How you doing?

Caller Ray:  I’m doing great, Mike.  I love the show.  First of all, I want to tell you I am a proud member of DADDD, which stands for Dads Against Daughters Dating Democrats.

Mike:  I might be a proud member of dads against daughters dating anyone that declares they’re with a party, D or R.

Caller Ray:  I understand that.  The reason I’m calling today is my wife got tired of hearing me preach about this and finally gave me permission to run for state office, and I’m looking into it.  I have a question before I do.  I figured you’d be the man to ask.  I’m reading my Constitution on amending the Constitution.  There are only two ways to do it.  One of them is Congress passes the amendment and three-fourths of the states ratify it.  The other way is —

Mike:  Two-thirds of the Congress pass the amendment.

Caller Ray:  The other way is that the states petition the congress for a constitutional convention.  My question is, couldn’t the states just get together and pass a damn amendment and tell them to stuff it?

Mike:  How do you phrase a “stuff it” amendment?

Caller Ray:  Let’s say, as an example, term limits.  Let’s say two-thirds of the states get together and consent on the language for term limits on the federal offices.  Wouldn’t the feds have to comply?

Mike:  Of course they would, if it was ratified by three-quarters of the states.

Caller Ray:  Then the problem we have is getting three-quarters of the states together to do this.

Mike:  Term limits is a non sequitur for me.

Caller Ray:  I was just using that as an example.  I have much bigger fish to fry.

Mike:  Patrick Henry said, in the Virginia Ratification Convention in June of 1788, reading Article V to the convention, he laughed at James Madison and George Nicholas and the federalists and said: There is no way — I don’t have the text in front of me, so I’m paraphrasing.  Henry said: There is no way this power will ever be exercised.  If we let this constitution be ratified in its current form, we will never secure any amendments of the second kind.  What he meant was the only way you’re ever going to get amendments is if the new central government proposes them, that the states would never again be able to marshal together enough people together in consensus to form an Article V amendment convention.  I think history has proven Henry correct because it still hasn’t happened.

Caller Ray:  I understand that.  In theory, if the states passed it, they would have to suck it up and follow it?

Mike:  In theory, if you’re going to have a convention and have amendments, the Compact for America at compactforamerica.org has a wonderful balanced budget amendment that requires if Congress wants to spend one penny over what it took in the preceding year, it has to have a majority vote from 26 of the state legislatures to do so.  It’s my proposition that the states would go ahead and do it anyway until the printing press runs dry, but at least it’s an effort.  There’s another amendment out there authored by Professor Randy Barnett at Georgetown University who’s been a guest on this show, a federalism amendment that would basically give the state legislatures some kind of a veto power over the acts of Congress.

There’s an amendment that Professor and Gutzman and I have co-authored that would basically set up a biannual council of the states.  You can have a special council whenever you want.  Let’s say the Supreme Court were to rule on something stupid like saying Obamacare, the Affordable Care Act, is constitutional.  You can have the Council of Revision, which is what we call it, meet.  If you got 26 votes from 26 states, they could overrule the Supreme Court.  They would just say: We’re exercising our plenary authority here.  We’re telling you you’ve overstepped.  Just because you didn’t correct them, you’re not the final word, buddy, we are.  We gave you power.

Caller Ray:  Wouldn’t that be nice?

Mike:  It would be.  The fact that we’re having this conversation demonstrates yet again that the Constitution is not the work of a God; it’s the work of fallible men.  They did not and could not have possibly foreseen all the damage and usurpations that would be visited upon the compact by designing men.  You have to perceive these things.  Their attitude was correct.  You have to go into the proceedings and legislative sessions or conventions with the foregone conclusion that whoever comes after you are going to try and undo what you did because they desire sex, power, and money.  It’s as simple as that.  So how can we stop them from exercising or from gaining sex, power and money by using the power that we’re about to confer upon them?  That’s the challenge.

Caller Ray:  I’m just kind of running off an idea I got from you, that the only way to get the leviathan under control is for the states to take back their power.  The only way I can see to do that is by forcing them to eat the amendments that the state forces on them.  That’s just a little idea I got and I think it’ll be the platform I try to run on.  We’ll see how it goes.

Mike:  I wish you luck and Godspeed.  Take that poem from Jefferson with you when you decide to run.  Remember that he asked the question: What constitutes a state?  We seem to think that a state is constituted by, in your example, the governor of Ohio, the Ohio Assembly and the Ohio Senate.  That’s what we think constitutes a state, its legislature.  That’s not what constitutes a state.  What constitutes a state are the sovereign people that live inside it.  The people are sovereign.  The people solely determine what powers they are going to grant to any government, in a self-governing society, that they’re going to be marginally or partially ruled by.  We’ve lost track of that.  It’s not the legislature, it’s not the governor, it’s the people.  The people are sovereign.  This is the argument, and if you’d purchased yourself a copy of What Lincoln Killed: Episode I, Ray, will help you mightily to understand this concept.  This was understood by most Jeffersonians at the time.  The states were not comprised of their governing functions.  The states were comprised of sovereign people.  Because the people were sovereign, it was the people who ultimately could say yes to the Constitution or no.

Ray, we know this because the manner of ratification is prescribed specifically as conventions in the several states.  The framers of the Constitution didn’t say the Constitution should be ratified by the state legislatures.  They said it should be ratified by conventions thereof, meaning the people would elect men to go to these conventions to represent them in their sovereign capacity and decide yea or nay on the question.  History has forgotten that the State of Rhode Island refused to send delegates to the convention.  The State of Rhode Island refused to ratify until the Constitution was in effect for three years.  History has forgotten that the State of North Carolina elected representatives to go to a convention in July and August and September of 1788.  The North Carolinians said: No, we don’t trust your new government.  We don’t want to be a part of it.  The sovereign people of North Carolina said no, and they had the right to do so.  No one at the time, there was not a soul alive that said because they lived in Lincoln’s North America that they were bound by the Constitution.  That would have made you a nincompoop.  That would have made you an idget of the highest order at that time.  It was the sovereign people of Rhode Island and North Carolina that said: No, we don’t want to be part of your little game, your little scheme here.  Ultimately both states did ratify but that was their choice.

In the same manner, Ray, the citizens of Ohio where you live can un-ratify.  My Louisiana fellow citizens can un-ratify.  We don’t have to secede.  We just declare our independence, un-ratify and say: You don’t rule us anymore.  We make the laws around here.  We’re not abiding by your stupid Affordable Care Act.  We’re not abiding by your EPA.  We’re not abiding by your Department of Interior.  We’re not abiding by anything you have to say, Congress, Senate, Obama, various federal agencies.  This is delusion that we live under because we have not educated our children, we’re not educating them right now, we’re letting them read mythology written by right-wing and left-wing demagogues over what a federal government is and how it gets its power.  This is largely our fault, in other words, Ray.  Are you going to correct that when you’re elected to the Ohio Assembly?

Caller Ray:  I really appreciate it.  It’s a history lesson every day listening to the show.  I love it.  I thank you so much.

End Mike Church Show Transcript